The Mapmaker's Opera
Bea Gonzalez
ISBN 10: 0007207794 ISBN 13: 9780007207794
Published by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, 2006
New
Soft cover
From
Ria Christie Collections, Uxbridge, United Kingdom
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About this Item
Description:
In. Seller Inventory # ria9780007207794_new
Synopsis:
In the tradition of Allende, this is a magical novel, written in the form of an opera, and set in Seville and Mexico in the late 1800s.
Act I opens in Seville. Emilio has been forced by his overbearing mother into the priesthood. Monica is a governess in a wealthy household who falls pregnant by the head of the house. A chance meeting in Seville cathedral suggests a solution to both their predicaments – they decide to marry, though it is not a love match. Emilio raises Monica's son Diego as his own, and they form a close bond over their mutual love of language, books, maps and birds. When Emilio dies, Monica reveals that he was not Diego's father. She grows ever more embittered and eventually dies, leaving Diego to pursue his true calling – his love of birds.
Act 2 follows Diego's life in Mexico – his apprenticeship to an American who is mapping the birds of Mexico; his love for Sofia, the beautiful, independent daughter of a Mexican farmer; and his obsession with saving the Passenger Pigeon from extinction. The cities of Seville and Mérida are so central to the narrative, and evoked so beautifully, that they are almost characters themselves.
Taking in many of the stock characters that appear in the best operas – the philanderer, the wronged wife, the harassed servant, the star-crossed lovers – The Mapmaker's Opera is an original and magical novel which will appeal to lovers of Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Isabel Allende.
About the Author:
Béa Gonzalez was born in Vigo, Spain and emigrated with her family to Canada as a child. Following studies in Spain and Toronto, she completed an MA in European Literature and Historical Studies at Kings College London.
She lives in Toronto with her husband and her two children.
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Bibliographic Details
Title: The Mapmaker's Opera
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
Publication Date: 2006
Binding: Soft cover
Condition: New