Whatever Happened to Dulce Veiga? : A B-Novel (Texas Pan American Series) [Paperback]

Caio Fernando Abreu (Author), Adria Frizzi (Author, Translator, Afterword)

Book Description

Series: Texas Pan American Series | Publication Date: January 2001

A forty-year-old Brazilian journalist reduced to living in a dilapidated building inhabited by a bizarre human fauna--fortune-tellers, transvestites, tango-loving Argentinean hustlers--is called upon to track down and write the story of Dulce Veiga, a famous singer who disappeared twenty years earlier on the eve of her first big show. Thus begins a mad race through an underground, nocturnal São Paulo among rock bands with eccentric names, feline reincarnations of Vita Sackville-West, ex-revolutionaries turned junkies, gay Pietas, echoes of Afro-Brazilian religions, and intimations of AIDS . . .

Constructed like a mystery, the novel unravels over a week, evoking a decadent and contaminated atmosphere in which the journalist's own search for meaning finds its expression in the elusive Dulce Veiga, who constantly appears to him as if in a dream, her arm pointing heavenward. Whatever Happened to Dulce Veiga? is a descent into the underworld of contemporary megalopolises where, like the inside of a huge TV, life intermingles with bits of music, film clips, and soap opera characters in a crazy and macabre dance, moving toward a possible catharsis.

(20010201)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Award-winning Brazilian writer Abreu's posthumously translated novel is a masterful, multidimensional account of a cynic's journey to self-knowledge. Seemingly a densely plotted homage to Dashiell Hammett's Phillip Marlowe, the story's action focuses on a nameless and existentially empty Brazilian journalist who's fallen on hard times. He lands a job finding and reporting on Dulce Veiga, a famous singer who vanished 20 years prior. His quest leads him through Sao Paulo's underground, where he encounters rock musicians, transvestites, hustlers, smack, crack, and gay Pietas. His descent into this contemporary inferno is rendered in seven sections, each corresponding to a day of the week, over which is woven a delicate web of symbols referencing AfroBrazilian cults and their gods, or orixas. Part literary detective story, part spiritual quest, the journalist's search is set to a streaming cacophony of snippets from various cults, American pulp fiction, songs, and films. Not since Alfred Appel's annotated Lolita clarified the subtle wordplay and allusions found in Nabokov's masterpiece has there been such an accessible assemblage beneath the packaging of compelling entertainment, all neatly explicated by translator Frizzi's analysis and glossary of terms. Whitney Scott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Not since Alfred Appel's annotated Lolita clarified the subtle wordplay and allusions found in Nabokov's masterpiece has there been such an accessible assemblage beneath the packaging of compelling entertainment, all neatly explicated by translator Frizzi's analysis and glossary of terms. (Whitney Scott Booklist )

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: University of Texas Press; annotated edition edition (January 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0292705018
• ISBN-13: 978-0292705012
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,029,493 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars We need more translations of Caio's books., November 8, 2000

By 

Sylvio (Arizona,USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Whatever Happened to Dulce Veiga? : A B-Novel (Texas Pan American Series) (Hardcover)

Caio is known in Brazil by his short stories. Whatever Happened to Dulce Veiga is his first and only novel and it is wonderful. I started reading Caio when I was in College in Brazil and since then I have a extremely passion for his works. I read some of his stories more than five times because they are full of poetry and beauty. He creates a world at once familiar and fabulous. After reading all his short stories and his post mortem book, I read Dulce Veiga. I don't know how I took so long. It's witty and magical. I may say that I was truly sorry when the book ended. I wanted more and I wanted to call him and tell how much I did I enjoy it. It was too late. He had died a year before I read it. Nevertheless I am happy that the book will be released in the U.S. I do hope the American public can understand Caio and his stories.

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Abreu tells a too surreal, gimicky tale.., May 12, 2005

By 

Peter LaPrade (worcester ma) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Whatever Happened to Dulce Veiga? : A B-Novel (Texas Pan American Series) (Paperback)

Caio Abreu has a interesting type of tale to tell, but it didn't quite work well. In his novel "Whatever Happened to Dulce Veiga?", a jaded journalist is send to cover a new musical group, and finds that one of them is the daughter of Dulce Veiga, who vanished over 20 years before. In between odd homoerotic fantasties and surreal images of a Brazilean cult, the journalist searches for Dulce and himself. The chapter are themed by days, and feature images of Brazilian cult "gods". I credit Abreu for his courage, but this isn't a good novel by any criteria