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Powell's Q&A, Q&A | December 13, 2009

Norberto Fuentes: IMG Powell's Q&A: Norberto Fuentes

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Describe your latest project. Norton has just published The Autobiography of Fidel Castro, a novel that took seven years of my life to complete as I... Continue »
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    The Autobiography of Fidel Castro

    Norberto Fuentes

The Tortilla Curtain

by T. C. Boyle

The Tortilla Curtain Cover

ISBN13: 9780140238280
ISBN10: 014023828x
Condition: Standard
All Product Details

Only 1 left in stock at $9.95!

Awards

Winner of the Prix Medicis Etranger
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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Topanga Canyon is home to two couples on a collision course. Los Angeles liberals Delaney and Kyra Mossbacher lead an ordered sushi-and-recycling existence in a newly gated hilltop community: he a sensitive nature writer, she an obsessive realtor. Mexican illegals Candido and America Rincon desperately cling to their vision of the American Dream as they fight off starvation in a makeshift camp deep in the ravine. And from the moment a freak accident brings Candido and Delaney into intimate contact, these four and their opposing worlds gradually intersect in what becomes a tragicomedy of error and misunderstanding.

Review:

"A compelling story of myopic misunderstanding and mutual tragedy." Chicago Tribune

Review:

"Succeeds in stealing the front page news and bringing it home to the great American tradition of the social novel...A book to appreciate as we peer at the faces of strangers outside our windows, and wall ourselves in." The Boston Globe

Review:

"What Boyle does, and does well, is lay on the line our national cult of hypocrisy. Comically and painfully he details the smug wastefulness of the haves and the vile misery of the have-nots....Red-blooded Americans of every stripe will find themselves rooting for Candido and America, right up to the rip-roaring deus ex machina ending that screams out that we are all in this together." Barbara Kingsolver, The Nation

Review:

"This highly engaging story subtly plays on our consciences, forcing us to form, confirm, or dispute social, political, and moral viewpoints. This is a profound and tragic tale, one that exposes not only a failed American Dream, but a failing America." Booklist

Synopsis:

From the author of The Road to Wellville comes his most controversial novel yet--a deeply moving story of the men and women who risk everything to cross the Mexican border and invade the American dream. "Succeeds in stealing the front page news and bringing it home to the great American tradition of the social novel".--The Boston Globe.

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About the Author

T.C. Boyle is the New York Times bestselling author of ten novels and has published seven collections of short fiction. He received the PEN/Faulkner Award for his novel World's End and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction. His stories appear regularly in the New Yorker, GQ, Esquire, and Playboy.

Visit his Web site at www.tcboyle.com.

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What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 5 comments:
Natalie Aldern, September 19, 2009 (view all comments by Natalie Aldern)
T.C. Boyle does a beautiful job of intertwining the tragic lives of multiple characters. He exposes the chasm between the privileged and the poor by focusing on a wealthy Angelino family that is unwittingly sharing their lives with several illegal immigrants. The callousness of the rich, contrasted with the immigrant's struggle to survive is heart breaking. Being a LA resident, the book really touched me- but the themes are universal and you won't want the novel to end.
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katejordahl, September 16, 2007 (view all comments by katejordahl)
I have just finished “The Tortilla Curtain” and feel crushed in a way by the hopelessness of the situation and relieved by a book that will open the discussion in a way that we can begin to address the distance between our hopes for ourselves as humans and the reality of our limitations. This book has been chosen by my college, Foothill College, Los Altos Hills, California, for our “One College, One Book, One Community initiative” so I am looking forward to exciting and challenging conversation in the coming school year. This book looks at movement of Mexicans to California in search of work, of upper middle class Americans to gated enclaves to avoid the Mexicans and of people hearts away from their beliefs to avoid the pain. The main characters must travel the immense distance from their intentions to the outcomes of their actions, but the author consistently acknowledges that their intentions are good and real despite the disastrous consequences of happenstance.
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lcwriter, May 30, 2007 (view all comments by lcwriter)
Thoughtful, tragic and timely. In a time when "illegal" immigration is the red herring of the day, this book illuminates white "liberal" as well as Mexican "criminal" minds. As with most of Boyle's work, it is at times comic and at times horrific. And, as with most of his work, it's entertaining while it teaches us something about ourselves and our world. Which is, after all, the point of good fiction.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780140238280
Author:
T. C. Boyle
Publisher:
Penguin Books
Author:
Boyle, T. Coraghessan
Author:
Boyle, T. C.
Location:
New York, N.Y.
Subject:
General
Subject:
Fiction
Subject:
Mystery & detective
Subject:
Married people
Subject:
Los angeles
Subject:
Mexicans
Subject:
Illegal aliens
Subject:
Domestic fiction
Subject:
Mexicans -- California -- Los Angeles -- Fiction.
Subject:
Literary
Subject:
Married people - California - Los Angeles -
Copyright:
1996
Edition Number:
Reprint ed.
Publication Date:
September 1996
Binding:
Paperback
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Y
Pages:
355
Dimensions:
7.78x5.07x.72 in. .56 lbs.
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