Book #20: American Visa - Juan De Recacoechea
"Armed with fake papers, a handful of gold nuggets, and a snazzy custom-made suit, an unemployed schoolteacher with a singular passion for detective fiction sets out from small-town Bolivia on a desperate quest for an American visa, his best hope for escaping his painful past and reuniting with his grown son in Miami.
Mario Alvarez's dream of emigration takes on a tragicomic twist on the rough streets of La Paz, Bolivia's seat of government. Alvarez embarks on a series of Kafkaesque adventures, crossing crooked politicians, crossing paths with a colorful cast of hustlers, social outcasts, and crooked politicians - and initiating a romance with a straight-shooting prostitute named Blanca. Spurred on by his detective fantasies and his own tribulations, he hatches a plan to rob a wealthy gold dealer, a decision that draws him into a web of high-society corruption but also brings him closer than ever to obtaining his ticket to paradise."
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The book tries. It tries to do more than it does, but it's just not well-written. It could be about crooked politicians and the political and economic realities of trying to get a visa and get out of Bolivia. Instead, it's a dime store detective/crime novel, with a touch of local color. Meh.
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