This book took me slightly over 2 months to read! I had to push myself through the last third of it - because I really didn’t want to DNF it. 

What initially attracted me to this book was its connection to Ciudad Juarez in Chihuahua, México. It’s south of El Paso on the Rio Grande and is widely recognized as one of the most violent cities for involvement in drug trafficking and murder of young women. I read it in the original Spanish, my first language yet at the present I read more English than Spanish and this also slowed me down.

The novel is divided into five parts and starting out it was hard to see how Juarez was involved - slowly we get to Mexico and the main characters we’ve begun the novel with fade and we are introduced to a new set of characters in part II. This is one of the things I disliked - I grew attached to the characters at the beginning and wanted to see how their lives unfolded.

The next two parts we meet new characters until we get to the “The Part about the Crimes”, part IV. Here I thought I would pick up pace as I had arrived at what brought me to the novel. It ended up being the opposite as the crimes’ description were gruesome and I dragged my feet for weeks through this part. Maybe it hit too close to home as I am only a few hours away from Juarez, maybe I’m too sensitive to descriptions of rape, murder and abuse against young women. I don’t know 🤷🏻‍♀️ but it took me weeks to get through a few hundred pages. 

Part V everything comes together and this was my favorite as some of the previous main characters show up again. Part V was easier to get through as the pace picks up and pieces fall together. Bolaño’s ability to bring back details to the present and show the reader his plot all along was impressive. 

I would not read this again as it is a very long novel, there’s many parts that are difficult to read and many vulgar depictions of women that were just annoying to have to read over and over again. 

However, I am glad I stuck it through to the end and can cross it off from my 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die List.