≫ Libro The Iguana Speaks My Name Plus Ten Backyard Stories From Panimache Roberto Moulun MD Richard Stafford Mikel Miller Marsh Cassady Ed Tasca Jorgina Jury Books

The Iguana Speaks My Name Plus Ten Backyard Stories From Panimache Roberto Moulun MD Richard Stafford Mikel Miller Marsh Cassady Ed Tasca Jorgina Jury Books

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The Iguana Speaks My Name Plus Ten Backyard Stories From Panimache Roberto Moulun MD Richard Stafford Mikel Miller Marsh Cassady Ed Tasca Jorgina Jury Books

Sometimes it's hard to tell what - and who - is real in this enchanting book. I decided to sit back and enjoy the ride, letting Moulun carry me away through exotic Guatemalan jungles, lakes, and highlands. He's a marvellous story teller. However I had to pause occasionally to savour his artistic turn of phrase. This book is really a great read.


Tags : Amazon.com: The Iguana Speaks My Name: Plus Ten Backyard Stories From Panimache (9780985774400): Roberto Moulun M.D., Richard Stafford, Mikel Miller, Marsh Cassady, Ed Tasca, Jorgina Jury: Books,Roberto Moulun M.D., Richard Stafford, Mikel Miller, Marsh Cassady, Ed Tasca, Jorgina Jury,The Iguana Speaks My Name: Plus Ten Backyard Stories From Panimache,EgretBooks.com,0985774401,FICTION Short Stories (single author)

The Iguana Speaks My Name Plus Ten Backyard Stories From Panimache Roberto Moulun MD Richard Stafford Mikel Miller Marsh Cassady Ed Tasca Jorgina Jury Books Reviews

This novella distills into a mere 110 pages everything that needs saying about the epic topics of war and peace, love and loss. In a voice uniquely his own, Moulun portrays the simple but profound pleasures of food, community, and the natural beauty of Panimache, an idyllic village on Lake Atitlan in the Guatemalan highlands. Villagers earn their living and go about the routines of daily life while ignoring the encroaching civil war until, like a circling noose, it surrounds them and takes its toll. The Guatemalan Civil War endured from 1960-'96, with a formal peace undeclared until 2001. The war resulted in up to 200,000 citizens' being killed or missing. We are given no time frame for events that transpire in the novella. In that way it takes on a timelessness, becomes a sort of allegorical Eden in which innocence is inevitably lost. The villagers stay aloof from the senseless politics of war, but like victims of war everywhere, they are nonexempt from paying a terrible price.

The story unfolds through the eyes of an anonymous narrator, though we get to know him intimately through his habits of expression, his observations and actions, his love of food, art, literature and animals. Nonetheless, we never know his name or profession or much about his background. We become further acquainted through internal dialogues with his alter egos The Professor and The Rogue. He is an amusing anomaly in his Guatemalan village, for he has refined tastes and a vast store of knowledge about Ancient, European, and American literature and art from which he makes surprising and frequent analogies with village characters. Nonetheless, we always feel his genuine love for them and his disregard for class distinctions.

This novella is an engaging, delightful take on the human comedy played out in the tropics, which ultimately becomes a powerful statement against the utter foolishness of war.

The book's second half comprises a collection of ten stories about Panimache villagers, most of whom we have met in the novella. They flesh out the portrait of the place, each a miniature gem crafted by a master. It is no wonder that this book was ranked among the top 25 independently published books of 2012.
Moulun weaves a tapestry as brilliantly colorful as the tejidos hawked in the streets and shops of Chichicastenango, Antigua and Guatemala City. A hidden village in the mountains overlooking Lake Atitlan in Guatemala, “The inhabitants of Panimache pretended not to notice the cloud of “war that raped the land and left a trail of orphans . The problems of everyday existence demand their attention, but a hostile outside world haunts their dreams and intrudes into their lives.

Moulun’s tapestry is of whole cloth, laced with a wide ranging dramatis personae. He employs the stresses of the times to reveal rich deeply human characters; some mundane, a few passionate, often drolly humorous, and frequently tragic.

His chapters in Iguana could stand alone as single anecdotes, each describing an aspect of the human condition; insightful displays of individual foibles and conflicting virtues. His Part Two Ten Backyard Stories from Panimache, is indeed a collection of stand-alone anecdotes, but they cleverly tie together as a whole with Part One.
Dr. Roberto Moulun was a French/Spanish native-born Guatemalan who traveled the world as a mental health specialist before retiring and, ultimately, settling near Lake Chapala in Mexico. His work reflects strongly the place, people and life of small village Guatemala.

In this book we have interrelated short stories set in the mountain village of Panimache, the tales being related by Quince, a keenly observant and slightly jaded writer who lives in the village. Some tales consist simply of Quince visiting with, eating with or talking with other villagers. Sometimes he wanders the streets or observes activity on the Plaza. Sometimes he tells old stories and legends, or tales of color and intrigue even if also of questionable provenance. (The book actually starts with an episodic novella, and ten vignettes follow. But, they are all interconnected and ultimately establish a single multi-faceted arc.)

This sounds like it could be the self-indulgent work of a retired amateur, or perhaps the overheated work of yet another magical realist wannabe. Well, no and no. Quince is a gracious, generous, and keenly intelligent observer, and through him Dr. Moulun displays his considerable and estimable talents for description, mood setting and the efficient and telling character sketch.

I know it sounds like phoney baloney, but as you sit quietly and absorb these stories you really do begin to feel like you're sitting on a veranda with a very strong cup of black coffee watching village life unfold. There are many graceful and poetic touches, but there is also rough humor and some very sharp and biting observations and exchanges. This is a mature and fully realized portrayal, not just a postcard view. And behind and above it all is the menace and consequence of the Guatemalan Civil War, a sobering reminder that danger lurks outside the village borders.

This is a vivid and embracing work full of fine craftsmanship and detail, and a very nice find.

Please note that I received a free ecopy of this book in exchange for a candid review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.
I love it.. the vivid prose painting images in my mind and voices speaking to my heart from another place and time.
Sometimes it's hard to tell what - and who - is real in this enchanting book. I decided to sit back and enjoy the ride, letting Moulun carry me away through exotic Guatemalan jungles, lakes, and highlands. He's a marvellous story teller. However I had to pause occasionally to savour his artistic turn of phrase. This book is really a great read.