Isabel Allende is one of the most widely-read authors in the world. More than 67 million
copies of her books have been sold. Allende’s bestselling first novel “The House of the Spirits”was published in 1982. Since then, she has authored more than twenty bestselling and criticallyacclaimed books. She has also received many awards, including an honorary doctorate degree from Harvard University, a PEN center lifetime achievement award, and a Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama.
Born in Peru and raised in Chile, Isabel Allende’s works sometimes contain aspects of
the Latin American tradition of magical realism. Her novels and memoirs interweave magic,romance, oppression, violence, and themes of redemption. She is known for her imaginative stories to the backdrop of significant historical events. Allende’s most recent novel “In The Midst of Winter” is set in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn.
“In The Midst of Winter, I finally found within me an invincible summer.”
-Albert Camus
After a suspiciously warm start to winter, a blizzard strikes New York in the first days of
the New Year, bringing the city to a standstill. Lucia Maraz, a visiting professor at NYU fromChile, is stuck in her basement apartment in Brooklyn’s Prospect Heights. Her landlord and bossat NYU, Richard Bowmaster, is both handsome and emotionally reserved. Lucia has resolved to break through his frigid exterior.
Richard reaches out to Lucia after a traffic accident with an undocumented immigrant
from Guatemala named Evelyn Ortega. Stuck in the middle of the snowstorm, Lucia, Evelyn, and Richard share secrets from their past with one another. Each has made difficult choices to pursue a life in Brooklyn. Evelyn has risked her life to escape the violence of Guatemala’s crime-ridden gang wars. Lucia fled Chile in the aftermath of the military coup, leaving her motherbehind to search for her missing brother. Richard, the American-born son of Holocaust survivors, travelled to Brazil where he found love, but also death and despair.
As the three lives intertwine, each will discover truths about themselves, and Richard
and Lucia will find a long-overdue closeness. As the title, borrowed from a quote by Albert Camus suggests, “In The Midst of Winter, I finally found within me an invincible summer.” The depth of feeling the characters experience during Brooklyn’s frigid winter makes for a compelling and timely novel as we experience the depths of winter in Brooklyn.