The thing I like most about reading is
that a good book can take you away to a different place and time.
Teresa Mendoza -- the main character of The Queen of the South
-- described it really appropriately. She said that you are changed
somewhat every time you read a good book.
I read a lot, and I can really become
absorbed in a good book. It can take me away; however, generally, the
books I read take me to someplace that I can imagine being and with
people I can imagine being with. The Queen of the South was
altogether different.
This was a world I can’t imagine even
existing, though I am certain it does. When you stop to think about
it, every character in this book was despicable, caught up in a life
that was cold and heartless and full of hate and drugs and
remorseless killing. It is from this world, and from this cast of
characters, that we had to choose our heroes and our villains.
It was really a very weird experience
for me, but I became thoroughly caught up in Teresa’s story. I
can’t say I ever became fond of her, but I was absorbed in her
life. She was a girl with no family, save the mobsters and narcos
with whom she lived. Patty became her sister. Oleg Yasikov became her
father.
If I could put her in a different life,
I might have liked her. I certainly admired her keen intelligence and
the way she made something of herself – more than something,
actually (keeping in mind the world in which she made something of
herself). And, within her own sordid little world, she had scruples.
She didn’t kill Pote Galvez for example, because he had been loyal
(in his own weird way) to her boyfriend and hadn’t raped her. In
fact, she made him her bodyguard, and he became utterly loyal to her.
But imagine being able to have someone killed without even giving it
a second thought. I don’t mean having the ability to do it. I mean
having a conscience that would allow it.
The ending took me by surprise. At the
beginning, I had theorized that Teresa had looked at the list that her
boyfriend Guero Davila had told her to give to his godfather. But
since it never really came up again (until the end), I sort of forgot
about it. What I didn’t forget about, however, was my confusion
about the telephone call that begins the entire book. I wondered all
along who would have made that phone call. If that phone rang, it
meant Guero was dead. But if his enemies killed him, then who would
have called her? Voila! The answer became clear when it was revealed
that Guero was an agent for the United States.
Keeping in mind that Teresa lived in an
evil world, I must say nevertheless that I loved reading about her
rich existence. I loved hearing about the clothes she wore and the
house in which she lived, and the people with whom she surrounded
herself. It’s hard to imagine having that much money.
I found Patty to be a very sad
character. She loved Teresa so much that I think she really gave
everything to her so that she could be happy. Then Patty herself, because she knew that Teresa would never love her back in the same way, tried to find happiness through cocaine and the fast life. I was very
afraid that Teresa was going to have her killed, and I’m glad that
didn’t happen, though her demise was sad enough.
Patty and Teresa. Aren’t those funny
names for women in this particular world? They sound like 1950s
cheerleaders.
I really liked the Russian mobster
Yasikov. Again, funny to say that, since he also lived within this
sordid world – killing people without a second thought. But he was
so kind to Teresa.
When I started the book, I wasn’t
sure I was going to like it. The author used a lot of words. But I
found his writing caught me hook, line, and sinker into the world of
the drug cartels. The first few sentences of the book created perhaps
my favorite beginning of any book I have read. It didn’t take long
before I was caught up in this book, despite its darkness.
I also thought that the transition back
and forth from third person (the story of Teresa) and first person
(the journalist’s gathering of facts) would be confusing. However,
I found the transitions to be smooth, and provided a way for the
journalist to tell the story of Teresa without having witnessed it
himself. His interviewees told the story.
I will definitely read something else
by Perez-Reverte. Perhaps the book The Club Dumas that I have
had on my shelf for years..
