Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
An uproarious novel about a man s often sordid, lifelong search for his possibly imaginary half brother
In 1960s Sao Paulo, teenage car thief and budding lothario Ciccio comes home each day to a house stuffed with books. His father, a scholar, cold and aloof, has spent his life acquiring them; his mother, by necessity, has spent her life organizing them. Ciccio himself feels like an afterthought in his own family, largely left to his own criminal devices.
Though forbidden to touch any of the volumes in the library, Ciccio sneaks off with The Golden Bough one day only to discover a decades-old letter hidden inside the book, addressed to his father from a mysterious woman in Berlin. Ciccio becomes convinced that his father must have had an affair with this woman in the years before World War II an affair that produced a son, a German brother who, real or imaginary, Ciccio becomes obsessed with tracking down. Thus begins a fractured coming-of-age tale, tawdry and epic by turns, about a lifelong obsession: one man s quest not only for his mythical sibling but for his father s respect.
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Synopsis
An uproarious novel about a man's often sordid, lifelong search for his possibly imaginary half brother
My German Brother is the renowned Brazilian musician and author Chico Buarque's attempt to reconstruct through fiction his obsessive lifelong search for a lost sibling.
In 1960s So Paulo, the teenage car thief and budding lothario Ciccio comes home each day to a house stuffed with books. His father, a journalist and scholar, has spent his life acquiring them; his mother, by necessity, has spent her life organizing this library. Ciccio feels like an afterthought in his own family, largely left to his own criminal devices. Forbidden to touch any of these books, Ciccio sneaks off with The Golden Bough one day to discover a decades-old letter hidden inside. The letter reveals an illicit affair his father carried on while posted in Nazi-era Berlin, an affair that resulted in the birth of a baby boy. The child, along with his mother, vanished into the chaos of the Second World War. Ciccio develops a fascination for his mysterious German brother: a fixation that becomes a mission, both comical and courageous, pursued over decades, through dead ends and embarrassments and cases of mistaken identity.
My German Brother is the project of a lifetime, combining what was, what might have been, and outright fabrication, all in order to arrive at the truth.