Line #5 Creator/IsabelAllende


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/allende_isabel_6.jpg]]
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3	Isabel Allende Llona (born August 2, 1942) is a UsefulNotes/{{Chile}}an writer, living in UsefulNotes/TheUnitedStates, with a lot of success worldwide. She is '''not''' the daughter of former [[UsefulNotes/PresidentsOfChile Chilean President]] Salvador Allende as some might believe, but rather his niece (Salvador and Isabel's dad are cousins); a mistake easy to make, since Salvador Allende ''does'' have a daughter named Isabel Allende Bussi, a career politician in Chile.
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5	Due to some HypeBacklash and the concept of TrueArt for some people, she is very much a polarizing author. The press has lauded her many times, but people like critic Harold Bloom or fellow Chilean writer Creator/RobertoBolano have bashed her numerous times, accusing her of churning out commercial literature, reinforcing female stereotypes, plagiarizing Creator/GabrielGarciaMarquez or just plain being a bad writer. In her native country, the vitriol is ten times more accentuated, especially considering how heavily some of her books lean towards WhatDoYouMeanItsNotPolitical.
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7	These considerations moved fellow writer Camilo Marks to write: "There's two ways to read Isabel Allende. The first consists on scrutizing every defect of her books, exposing them in detail and send her to the pits of Hell by an unappealable, self-satisfied, founded guilty verdict. The second is built on the premise that it is legitimate to spend a good time reading her narrations, as they are entertaining, it's not hard to get caught by them and they do have merits that attract the massive crowd or even more demanding readers. Between both extremes is hard to find a middle point."
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9	She also wrote a well-received novel about DerivativeWorks/{{Zorro}}, fittingly named ''Literature/{{Zorro\|2005}}'' outlining his early years.
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11	!!Allende's works
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13	* ''Literature/TheHouseOfTheSpirits'' (1982)
14	* ''Literature/OfLoveAndShadows'' (1985)
15	* ''Literature/EvaLuna'' (1987)
16	* ''Literature/DaughterOfFortune'' (1999)
17	* ''Literature/PortraitInSepia'' (2000)
18	* ''Literature/MemoriesOfTheEagleAndTheJaguar'' series
19	** ''City of the Beasts'' (2002)
20	** ''Kingdom of the Golden Dragon'' (2004)
21	** ''Forest of the Pygmies'' (2005)
22	* ''Literature/{{Zorro\|2005}}'' (2005)
23	* ''Literature/IslandBeneathTheSea'' (2009)
24	* ''Literature/MayasNotebook'' (2011)
25	* ''Literature/{{Ripper\|2014}}'' (2014)
26	* ''Literature/TheJapaneseLover'' (2015)
27	* ''Literature/InTheMidstOfWinter'' (2016)
28	* ''Literature/ALongPetalOfTheSea'' (2019)
29	* ''Literature/{{Violeta}}'' (2022)
30	* ''Literature/TheWindKnowsMyName'' (2023)
31	----
32
33	!!Tropes present in Allende's works
34	* ContinuityNod: The Del Valle family. Clara's parents Severo and Nivea Del Valle appear (briefly) in ''The House of the Spirits''. In ''Daughter of Fortune'' Paulina Del Valle starts building her empire, which she continues to do in ''Portrait in Sepia''. ''Portrait'' also features Nivea and Severo's reappearance; he is Paulina's nephew, and she takes him in as her protégé. Nivea ends up marrying him. In ''Violeta'' Nivea is mentioned as Violeta’s paternal grandmother.
35	* IncompatibleOrientation: Seen in ''Violeta'' with José Antonio and [[ClosetGay Miss Taylor]], and in ''Of Love and Shadows'' with Marco's crush on Francisco, who is straight.
36	* AnImmigrantsTale:
37	** Evelyn in ''In the Midst of Winter'' crosses the border as an unaccompanied minor. In the same book, after the 1973 Chilean coup, Lucia is forced to go into exile.
38	** Zarité leaves Saint Domingue shortly after the Haitian revolution, and eventually ends up in New Orleans, where she finally becomes a freewoman.
39	** In ''A Long Petal Of The Sea'' Roser Bruguera and Victor Dalmau are forced to leave Spain due to UsefulNotes/SpanishCivilWar and eventually arrive to Chile in the ''Winchester''.
40	* ParentalAbandonment: Evelyn's mother leaves her and her two brothers in the care of their grandmother in rural Guatemala while she works and sends money from the United States in ''In the Midst of Winter''; in ''Maya's Notebook'', Maya's mother abandons her and her father is too busy, so she is primarily in her grandmother's care.
41	* SoBeautifulItsACurse: If you are a HeadTurningBeauty in one of Allende's books, you won't make it to the final page. Likely due to DeathByChildbirth
42	** Rosa from ''Literature/TheHouseOfTheSpirits'' is poisoned just before she marries Esteban Trueba.
43	** In ''Portrait in Sepia'', Lynn falls in love with a man who seduces her as part of a bet and dumps her when he is done. When she turns out to be pregnant, he abandons her. She later dies after giving birth to protagonist Aurora.
44	** In ''Island Beneath The Sea'' Rosette is imprisoned while pregnant. By the time she is released, the prison conditions have left her so weak that she dies shortly after delivering her son.

Context Creator / IsabelAllende