Need to read this again. Hard to follow unless one is familiar with events and persons involved.

Vargas Llosa wanted to make a (widely-shared and uncontroversially correct) point about American blundering in Latin America, but this read more like an essay with some gestures towards the historical figures having interiority, rather than actual fiction.

Something about Vargas Llosa just doesn't click for me.

Excellent. I had some idea of US meddling in central America on behalf of United Fruit but never Al realized how much.

وضعیت عجیبیه. رمان جدید نویسنده محبوبم رو خوندم، ولی یک ماه طولش دادم. و الان هم که تموم شده، اگه بخوام بگم که درمورد چی بود، نمی تونم :)) خیلی کلی بخوام بگم، وضعیت آمریکای لاتین و گواتمالا به صورت اختصاصی.
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همه چیز از یه موز شروع شد.
و کشوری که (گواتمالا) به خاطر منافع شرکت یونایتد فروت (که موز می‌فروخت) به فنا رفت. اصلاحات ارضی قرار بود انجام بشه و یونایتد فروت باید مالیات می‌داد و دیگه از بهره‌کشی خبری نبود. پس چیکار کرد؟ آمریکا رو علیه گواتمالا شوروند و گفت اینا کمونیستن (درحالی که خاکوبو آربنز خودش طرفدار دموکراسی و سرمایه‌داری آمریکایی بود و همه این کارا رو برای به آمریکا شبیه شدن انجام داده بود.) و آمریکا هم یه کودتا راه انداخت تا همه نظام رو تغییر بده و وضعیت به شلم شوربایی رو به عقب تبدیل شد.
اما داستان انگار یه برش از تاریخه و سرانجام خاصی نداره. خیلی سردرگم کننده ست. و پره از اطلاعات تاریخی پشت سر همی که بر گیجی شما می‌افزایند. ارتباط‌هایی با سوربز و تروخیو داره و یه کاری کرد دلم بخواد دوباره برم سراغ کتاب محبوبم.

The horrible history of the CIA, United Fruit and Edward Bernays in their 5 decade assault on Guatemala

Truth and fiction intermingle in this fluid true-story narrative: the events are real. The characters and situations are re-created. And the lies that overthrew the democratically-elected president of Guatemala were not. In it, we can imagine the way that the US-based United Fruit Company fabricated a lie and used it to join forces with governments, disaffected mercenaries, and enemies of Guatemala's president's to stage a coup d'état. The process, if not the change of government, changed the course of history in Latin America. Despite the fact that the outcome is known to history, the reader can't help to sit in suspense until the last moment, hoping against hope that this time it could be different.
Stories like this break my heart. Vargas Llosa is a favorite author of mine, precisely because his work illustrates so well the passions and weaknesses of human nature. His portrayal of time so closely reflects reality--it doesn't really pass in an orderly, linear fashion, as we would like to believe, but instead takes unanticipated trips to the past alongside possible projections into the future. This is lyrical imagining of the details of historical reality, breathing humanity into what we read coldly in textbooks. It is also a timely reminder (although perhaps new to some?) of what the US Government and human nature are capable of doing in the quest for power and money.
I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.