Customer Reviews

Thursday Night Widows

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Despite the tacky cover, this book is no potboiler. Instead, the cover accurately reflects the values of the beautiful people of Cascade Heights, a gated and walled residential community thirty miles outside Buenos Aires with full-service security-along with a golf course and top-quality tennis. The wealthy residents of The Cascade have left their old lives behind, and low live in elaborately built houses with spectacular landscaping, a world apart. Argentine author Claudia Pineiro carefully analyzes the behavior of these residents, concentrating, in particular, on four couples-Ronie and Virginia Guevara, El Tano and Teresa Scaglia, Gustavo and Carla Masotta, and Martin and Lala Urovich-who live in the same neighborhood. The men play cards at El Tano's house every Thursday night while the women go to the cinema.

The novel begins on Thursday night, September 27, 2001, when Teresa Scaglia returns home and doesn't hear any noise from the card room or pool. She soon discovers that El Tano and two of his friends are dead. Using Virginia Guevara, a real estate agent who also lives in the compound, as the primary narrator, the author dissects the lives of these characters in the ten years leading up to this September, 2001 event, skewering their pretenses, their blatant dishonesty, their flouting of the law, and their feeling of entitlement. Recent years have been marked by a severe economic downturn in Argentina, however. As Virginia says: "Many of our neighbors made the mistake of thinking that they could keep spending as much as they earned forever. And what they earned was a lot, and seemed eternal. But there comes a day when the taps are turned off."

With her tongue firmly set in her cheek, the author creates a story filled with dark ironies, and by making their problems similar to those of any other self-protecting, upscale suburban community, regardless of country, she succeeds in creating identification between the outrageous characters and her readers. These characters' lives are just close enough to the norm that they seem in many ways "ordinary," their behavior, however extreme, common enough that it is easily recognizable for what it is. Their casual dishonesty is a given. Because they are extreme stereotypes, they are laughable.

By the time the reader discovers how the men have died, that revelation comes as no surprise. Interesting for its picture of the effects of a global economic downturn on one community of wealthy businessmen, it is also an unforgettable picture of the empty lives which these men and their wives are happy to lead-the "causes" they adopt which accomplish nothing, their view of reality which is limited to their own social class, the inability to communicate with anyone because their individual lives are so egocentric. Great fun to read and often darkly humorous, this novel is a clear and uncomplicated social commentary which readers from many parts of the world may enjoy. Mary Whipple

This book was everything I hoped it would be, based on the intriguing description. Now that I've read it, I'm eagerly awaiting future English translations of works by Claudia Pineiro. I'd also like to see the movie based on this book, currently in production by director Marcelo Piñeyro. I'm so thankful for Bitter Lemon Press, the publisher who keeps finding these gems of novels - such as this one, and the Havana Quartet by Leonardo Padura.

I found it incredibly unusual to set a crime novel in a lush, gated community outside Buenos Aires. I thought I would be struck by how different life in Argentina is - but for these moderately wealthy characters, it seems that their cares, worries, anxieties - even flaws and shallowness - are much more similar to USA or UK than I would have expected. The story takes place in 2001, with flashbacks throughout the 1990s - during times of economic upheaval and job losses. The current economic crisis made the story hit home a bit more, especially as everyone I know has the same worries (as the main characters in this book) about their job, career, finances.

However, this is a rich, fun tale - a dark comedy really - about a set of richly drawn characters who do crazy things. Thoroughly enjoyable - I read it in just 2 days.

As Argentina falls apart due to an economic collapse of incredible proportions just after 9/11, the country seems on the verge of anarchy with no place that is safe. That is except for the well to do living in gated communities that insulate them from what is going on outside except for the TV news and their outside employment.

In the Buenos Aires gated community Cascade Heights, four men (El Tano Scaglia, Martín Urovich Gustavo Masotta and Ronie Guevara) have dinner together every Thursday night. However, this time is different as three lie dead in the swimming pool at the most affluent Scaglia home; only Guevara who left early remains alive. How could this happen especially to someone as influential and powerful as El Tano is on the minds of their family members as all assume a horrific electrical accident occurred. However, Virginia Guevara though curious and shocked fears for her Ronie who behaves strangely since the incident and she believes he knows something more.

This is an interesting look at Argentina in which the upper class behaved like Nero fiddling away while the country collapsed. The story line is mostly told through Virginia's eyes as a successful realtor to the wealthy. Although insightful with a strong cast who warn readers to beware of growing exponential gaps between the affluent and the middle class, the mystery of the pool takes a back seat to the discerning look at the gilded life behind the gated community.

Harriet Klausner

Settle down with a pot of tea, or a bottle of wine, like a denizen of Cascades Heights, and enjoy the rarefied lifestyle inside a gated estate outside Buenos Aires!

You never have to lock your doors. Criminals can't get past the perimeter wall and armed security guards. And with all the regulation flowering bushes, the air is overwhelmingly sweet in every season. Argentina is suffering from the post-9/11 economic crisis, but the residents of Cascade Heights can feel perfectly safe.

Nonetheless, the book opens with three dead bodies floating at the bottom of a swimming pool.

The Cascade (for short) may be a paradise on earth - but not to wives who can't make friends, husbands who can't keep their jobs and children who don't fit the mold.

The turnover in luxury homes is one indication of trouble. But at least it's a plus for real estate agent Virginia Guevara. Through her own efforts Virginia manages to hang onto her lovely home, despite an unemployed husband, while other less fortunate residents come and go.

We see the dramas going on inside various homes in this book, but I won't give away any of that - or the mystery surrounding the main drama, and the ethical dilemma it raises.

Thursday Night Widows is flawless social satire - as well as an entertaining read. It's an excursion into a way of life that's totally foreign (to me, anyway). And it goes beyond any particular economic crisis to grapple with the basic insecurity of the human condition.

Claudia Piñeiro has written several books, but this is the only one available in English. I'm hoping a translator is at work on the others.

Virginia is worried about her son, Juani. She believes that he is getting into trouble. She keeps finding reasons to go into his bedroom, hoping to find what...she doesn't know. Virginia's husband, Ronie comes home early. Virginia was in the kitchen when she heard a shout and a loud thud. She goes outside to find Ronie, lying on the ground with his leg broken. As they are driving to the hospital, Ronie sounds for Virginia to take him to El Tano.

Teresa Scaglia returns home late from her night out. She finds champagne glasses everywhere, and her husband's two friends, Gustavo Masotta and Martin Urovich
SUVs in the driveway but no sign of any of them. Unfortunately, in the morning, Teresa will discover her husband, Gustavo and Martin's bodies at the bottom of their swimming pool.

I really liked how this book started out. It came right up in my face and grabbed me. The adrenaline rush I felt was short lived. I couldn't find a connection with any of the characters. They lived in their own world. I found the way they reacted to situations a bit over the top. I mean the situations were real but here is an example... Virginia and Ronie's son, Juani smoked some pot and who knows if it still did not but just because he did it once, he was now on "The List". A list of kids who do drugs.

One of the other things that I didn't like was the abrupt change in the story. I took my a moment to realize that the beginning was really the end and that the story then started up going back in time to all the events leading up to the bodies. Though, I did like that the last part of the book tied up all the loose ends and explained what happened.