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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Stories from Lima La Horrible, April 8, 2005
Globalization is a funny thing. Who would think that one of the best up and coming South American writers would be a Peruvian American from Birmingham, Alabama who writes in English. What makes him a South American is that Alarcon is a gifted chronicler of life in Lima, Peru. There is nothing nostalgic or romantacized about Alarcon's Lima. It's Lima, La Horrible. A grotesque, third world city that is for some odd reason is an almost charming city in its weirdness. As an American going back to the city where he was born, Alarcon sees Lima in a way most Peruvians miss. Alarcon has no need for magic realism. Alarcon's protagonists are handyman thieves, unemployed bank clerks, dog killing revolutionaries and journalists who on occassion ride the city's buses dressed in clown outfits. Throw in a parade of shoe shine boys and a Senderista or two and you have that strange mix that is modern day Lima. Alarcon's short stories are precise and well written. You can almost see the finger prints of the Iowa Writers Workshop. This is a very good first collection of short stories for a young writer. I am looking forward to seeing future books. It will be interesting to see whether he stays a South American writer or turns his talents to the Latino immigrant experience in the United States.
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16 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Halfway between three and four, March 30, 2005
This slim book of stories has been touted as one of the best books of spring. In "Third Avenue Suicide," a young American, David, lives with a woman of Indian descent in a Manhattan apartment. Her mother is set on having Reena marry a man of her own race, so Reena and David hide all traces of David's living with Reena whenever the mother pops over, which is quite a lot. "They had been living in the apartment for ten days when David was first asked to disappear." This would be a humorous in-law type tale except for a tragic development way out of left field which makes David feel like an exile from his own life. In "Absence," a Peruvian painter called Wari is visiting New York where a show of his work is going up at a university-affiliated gallery. In flashback he contrasts the hopelessness of his life in Lima, with the marvels of Manhattan, and contemplates not going back, casting his fate to the winds of exile. His show is not well received and, as Daniel Alarcon describes his paintings, they are not memorable. Wari befriends the girlfriend of his American sponsor, a warmhearted woman called Leah, who attracts him with her efforts at intimacy. Several of the stories take place in Latin America, where a revolution is going on. Perhaps the strongest of these is "Lima, Peru, July 28, 1979" in which a cadre of young rebels spends the night killing black dogs, each one representing a capitalist. When Lima runs out of stray black mutts, the narrator, Pintor, is charged with painting the not-quite black ones a more solid black. Alarcon makes heavy play out of the way that Lima's packs of feral dogs resemble the young men who want them dead. Pintor winds up having a confrontation with a well-meaning policeman that ends in an unhappy way. "City of Clowns," which was first published in the prestigious magazine THE NEW YORKER, is the longest and most contrived of all the stories here. I can imagine many enjoying Alarcon's talents, but to appreciate WAR BY CANDLELIGHT, you will have to have a large tolerance for the kind of awkward symbolism that was popular in the heyday of Irwin Shaw. No magic realism here, just a dim way of looking at a world in chaos. Although young Alarcon holds an MFA from Iowa Writers Workshop, his style is not quite leaden, but something close to it. What's another word for "leaden" that's a bit less heavy? How about "Tinny?" "Wooden?" Anyhow, the book is no disaster, just a disappointment in the face of the campaign hype that promised us a new Salman Rushdie or Orhan Pamuk in our midst.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An extraordinary debut collection., October 29, 2008
The stories in this debut collection are extraordinary. Daniel Alarcón was born in Lima, raised in Alabama, spent time in Peru as a Fulbright scholar, and now lives in Oakland. Most of the stories in "War by Candlelight" are set in Peru; three take place in New York City. Whether writing about political instability in Lima or emotional turmoil in Manhattan, Alarcón writes with a kind of unobtrusive brilliance that is astonishing. I'd finish one of these stories, marvel at how awesome it was, only to find the next one even more brilliant. "Third Avenue Suicide" (in which Reena, an Indian immigrant, keeps stalling on introducing her Peruvian boyfriend to her mother), "Lima. Peru. July 28" (a painter gets sucked into revolutionary violence), "A science for being alone" (Miguel learns that his former girl friend, the mother of his five-year old daughter, whom he has planned to propose to, intends to emigrate to the U.S.) were three of my favorites. All three are extraordinary, But they are eclipsed by the title story, and by "City of Clowns", probably the best short story I've read in the last five years. It's not just the writing that is excellent. Whether it's a result of the insight that comes from the dual perspective of the emigrant, or a consequence of Alarcón's innate smartness, there is genuine wisdom in these wonderful, disturbing stories. I highly recommend "War by Candlelight".
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