I want to read and buy it, but I don't know how to do it or how to read the back of the book, I want it in spanish please

"Fish in the Water" is a surprisingly honest book and therefore a very interesting autobiography. Split between his childhood and his failed bid for president, Vargas Llosa does more than give a personal chronology of his life: he presents a searing and critical examination of Peruvian society as a whole, from its ongoing political corruption to the complex levels of racism that plague everyone in this nation.

He details his escapades as a Bohemian, where he experimented with cocaine at the age of 14 and became a regular at several brothels. He talks about his first failed marriage and the brutality of his father. And he gives some very personal insights into some of his most famous books, like "The Green House" and "Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter." Fans of his novels will find these sections very satisfying.

But also, he provides a detailed account of his three-year run for the Peruvian leadership, in which he was constantly attacked verbally by opposition forces and physically threatened by the opposition's cronies. He talks about his frustration and relief at losing the campaign to Fujimori, a virtual unknown in Peruvian politics. And he even predicts the downfall of Fujimori via Montesinos, who even in 1993 was a notoriously corrupt figure.

Rarely do we get such a clear, firsthand account of the politics in Latin America. This book is a real treat.

This book was just simply great. I'm not going to say anything about it because I'd give it away, but I will say that it was just perfectly constructed. It keeps you in suspense all the time it's just perfect. It's a keeper.

To be an author is hard, one strives for originality. That's what I found in a "Writer's reality," an author who is original in his stories yet the ideas are still there. Peru, I found has a lot of problems or everyday things that any author can just grab and make a story about, the only thing there is is originality. But what is it really? The process is the original way the author strives to make the story unique and perfect, thought it made not sound real because fiction is not real,is a still his work(original work). So to any writer that wishes to understand how it worked for Mario Vargas, I advise you to read this book because you, like me might be striving for perfection and originality but if you read this book you will find that if Mario Vargaz did it, then we can do it too. Finish the story and still be original, no matter what inspire or who inspire your idea.

Forget about political theories, economical utopias and planet-sized libraries. Theories and books do not matter as much as that which the minds perceive, and how those minds carry out what the books say.

If you want the truth about Latin American extremist psychology, how they explain and justify their existence and misery and how they blame the "superpowers" for everything from global warming to hunger in Ethiopia, read this book! Learn how they weave their demagogic conspiracy theories using partial truths and superficial, apparent logic. The book is not only about the presidential leaders like Castro. It also describes the mind of the young, yet-unknown political leader in college (most of the time a leftwing extremist) that sparks the creation of groups than in turn revere the "big guys".

The book is so real that reading it is like living in Latin America for about 10 years. Reading it gives more information than 10 years of analyzing the economy and politics of Latin America. Minds move people and change the political course of nations.

Recommended for students, politicians, strategists, business people, and anybody wanting to visit Latin America for more than a few days.

I was very surprised to finally read a book that doesn't portray Latin America as a "victim" of the US or the Old World. I think these three authors intelligently challenge the populist ideologies and myths of the left and the right that have made so much damage all over the spanish speaking countries south of the USA. Having met many "perfect latin american idiots" in the past, I can see now why they are so enraged with the succes of this book. They are perfectly described and they don't look pretty. For anyone else, this book offers a fresh, sharp insight in to Latin American issues that until recently were considered property of marxist and nationalist leaning intellectuals. These writers are shooting straight to the heart and they make no apologies.

Brilliant....outstanding! Highly recommended!

This book is for Latin America what the fall of the Berlin Wall was for Europe.

Required reading for those interested in understanding Latin America and why it has been unable to achieve sustainable development, democratic stability and constructive relations with the United States.

"Guide to the Perfect Latin American Idiot" has been a best-seller throughout Latin America since its 1996 publication in Spanish. This fact, and its three distinguished authors representing different national perspectives, symbolize the dramatic paradigm shift taking place in the region.

This book is ideal for introductory courses in Latin American Studies to counter the rigid leftist orthodoxy and "political correctness" that dominates so many universities, high schools, NGOs and international agencies. It is these outdated leftist views that have confused and misled so many about why Latin America and the Caribbean continue to be mired in poverty, violence, corruption and underdevelopment.

It demonstrates how leftist "idiots" not only in Latin America, but those in the United States and Europe, have paralyzed the region in a culture of "victimization", creating deep resentments and distrust of market economies, private property, foreign investment, multinational corporations, globalization and the United States. It is these leftist-statist-mercantilist-corporatist attitudes that dominated many Latin Americans throughout the 20th century and continue even today, as so clearly demonstrated by Castro in Cuba, Chavez in Venezuela, Ortega in Nicaragua, Aristide in Haiti, Bucaram in Ecuador, Allan Garcia in Peru, Lula in Brazil among others. It is these, combined with dsyfunctional anti-democratic and anti-market cultural values, that have maintained the region in poverty and political instability. The Latin American poor owe a debt of gratitude to Apuleyo, Montaner and Vargas Llosa for so forcefully showing how these attitudes and populist leaders have contributed to their misery.

For an even broader perspective of these historic changes, readers should also see "Fabricantes de Miseria" by the same authors; "No Perdamos Tambien El Siglo XXI" by Carlos Alberto Montaner; writings by the argentine Mariano Grandona, the peruvian Hernando De Soto, the venezuelan Carlos Rangel, the region's leading intellectual Mario Vargas Llosa; and books by Lawrence Harrison, Francis Fukuyama and those contributors to "Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress".

This book has the most amazing sense of voice and character I have ever read. The storyteller recounts the Machiguengas' mythology, day to day life, and even a few familiar stories (Kafka's The Metamorphosis) with an achingly beautiful love for the subject matter combined with the bitter knowledge that all this might be lost. The writer in Firenze sounds like a writer, constantly making connections between actions and the larger, metaphorical picture. The book delves into more than just a tribe, but the human mind as well. I think I'll read it again, next time in Spanish.

Part mystery, part fictional biography, part travelogue, part ethnological study, this intriguing tale draws the reader into its onion-like structure. A Peruvian scholar has set himself several academic tasks to be accomplished in Florence, Italy, where he has traveled for a respite from his homeland. While there the narrator discovers a gallery exhibiting photographs of the same Amazonian tribe, the Machiguenga, that he had visited years earlier and never forgotten. One photograph fascinates him, driving him to decipher the story of the storyteller depicted in shadow. As the narrator traces the history of his college friend, Saul Zuratas, who has not been heard from since he allegedly emigrated to Israel many years earlier, the reader is reminded of Joseph Conrad's narrator Marlow, who recounts the tale of his friend Kurtz, who also disappears into the jungle. The novel explores the evolution of an individual from contemporary Latin American urban life to tribal life in the jungle, as he becomes so obsessed by the tribe that in time he undergoes a conversion. Gradually he changes from his role as an ethnologist studying Machiguenga culture and passionately supporting its preservation to a role as one of the tribes's central figures, a "talker." Issues of cultural and environmental integrity, of what is "primitive" versus "advanced," and of what modern society truly offers in a setting in which the environment and its inhabitants have successfully coexisted for thousands of years, are treated with great intelligence and sensitivity. The narrator as a writer envies his friend's ability to spin tales, wondering at the mystery of transformation from the Spanish native tongue and civilization to the "crackling" language of the Machiguengas and their pagan, animistic belief system. In his youth Zarutas condemns the missionaries, holding that the imposition of their beliefs upon the Indians only produces a nation of zombies. Interestingly, he later recount! s the Christian story to "his" people in their own language, terminology, and frame of reference. Vargas also treats issues of disfigurement: individual, ethnic, and environmental, as well as the related issues of alienation and acceptance, of being an outsider. The audience is given much to consider and marvel at through the spellbinding artistry of the storyteller.

Dreamlike and unique, a picture in a European gallery opens the door to a world of myth both modern and ancient. Incandescent writing by a master describing the search for an old friend ending in a visit to an Amazonian tribe and a meeting with the Storyteller. Read it and enjoy this modern fable...I highly enjoyed this book!

Many memoirs have the benefit of allowing us a personal interpretation on events we have observed in the media on a more superficial scale. The main attraction of this memoir is being able to catch a glimpse of the real life events that later shaped Vargas Llosa's amazing fiction. The fact that his early life was the foundation of many of his great works (Conversations in the Cathedral, Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter etc)is perhaps suggestion enough to the avid Vargas Llosa reader that the accounts of his childhood, adolescence and early manhood are sure to be fascinating, and indeed they are.

The stories of his early life are interspersed with his ill fated run for Presidency in Peru much later in his life. Although this section is also well written and offers an insightful if rather bleak view of the politics of the third world it doesn't match the magic and narrative interest of his earlier memoirs.

Overall this book presents a portrait of a wise, humble and compassionate man who struggles to come to terms with his ambivalence for his homeland.

Mario Vargas Llosa's account of his presidential campaign, interwoven with a memoir of his childhood and young adulthood, is compelling. It is a shame that someone with such a practical, intelligent and courageous plan for governing Peru was not elected. Vargas Llosa has serious doubts that Peru will ever become a "serious" nation, and after reading A Fish in the Water it's difficult to disagree. The insights into racism in Peru are fascinating, and the story of his young life is entertaining and at times moving, especially as it concerns his abusive father. This work is not at all self-serving, and yet the reader cannot help but admire (and like) Vargas Llosa. My only quibble is that some of the passages of his college days are overlong with lists of friends and acquaintances, some of whom are not remarkable and could have easily been left out. But Vargas Llosa, as usual, has produced a work of rigor and grace.

A Fish In the Water is Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa's bittersweet tale of the three years he spent in public life and of his quixotic campaign for the presidency of his native Peru.

His candidacy, he says, all came about "through the caprice of the wheel of fortune." At the time, he thought his decision to run for president of Peru was a "moral" one. "Circumstances," he writes, "placed me in a position of leadership at a critical moment in the life of my country." But Vargas Llosa is first and foremost a writer, not a politician, and so he has been willing to dig a little deeper into the reasoning behind his decision. "If the decadence, the impoverishment, the terrorism, and the multiple crises of Peruvian society had not made it an almost impossible challenge to govern such a country, it would never have entered my head to accept such a task." Motivation doesn't get much more quixotic than that.

Even more engaging than Vargas Llosa's revelations about his unsuccessful foray into the political world, are his reminiscences about his childhood and youth, which he intersperses throughout this book. He begins with a vivid and traumatic memory: the revelation by his mother that his father, whom the author thought had died before his birth, was, in reality, alive and waiting to meet him in a nearby hotel. It was a revelation that Vargas Llosa did not greet with joy.

In fiction, the cruelties experienced in childhood might be used to help explain the adult who survived them, but Vargas Llosa wisely makes no attempt to connect the two. The sections regarding the presidential campaign and those on his youth run along parallel tracks, but the story of his early life trails off after his graduation from college and his decision to go to Europe to write. The matter-of-fact air about the stories suggests that Vargas Llosa is more concerned with remembering than with interpreting and analyzing.

While the personal memories make for the most compelling reading, the campaign memoir does offer a convincing self-portrait of a political innocent sinking under a tide of democratic absurdities. Wildly popular at first, Vargas Llosa presented a coherent, but harsh, economic plan to his fellow Peruvians and rapidly became Peru's sacrificial llama. Near the end of the campaign, he endured catcalls, stone throwing and scurrilous allegations about almost everything, including his books.

Those of us who know and love Vargas Llosa and his books greeted his loss to Alberto Fujimori with more than one sigh of relief. But anyone who has an interest in the gorgeous landscape of Peru, Latin American politics, or the magnificent works of Mario Vargas Llosa will find this book essential reading.

People always repeat the phrase, "don't judge a book by its cover", but the cover of my copy of THE REAL LIFE OF ALEJANDRO MAYTA expresses the content more appropriately than almost any other cover I can remember in that it points directly to Peru and the central problem of literature. A mass of Peruvian-style figures stand in darkness, almost obscured. You have to look carefully to see them at all. A single chink in the cell door, a single beam of light in a dark place---all that is revealed in color are the eyes and brow of a solitary man. Do we know what is happening in Peru---exploited, misgoverned, racked by revolution and poverty ? Can we know what really happens in life ? Can we understand the motivations and deepest emotions of other human beings ? Can literature actually create or, at least, reproduce these ?

Vargas Llosa creates a gripping novel out of unlikely pieces. An obscure Trotskyite revolutionary, a member of a party whose membership stands at seven, gets involved in an uprising in an Andean town in 1958. The author-as-narrator is in Paris at the time. He returns to Peru later and in 1983, spends a year trying to track down the people involved (family, colleagues, co-conspirators), to learn what motivated this event and its central character, Alejandro Mayta. He interviews everyone he can find. We jump between these interviews and the re-creation (or is it the actual truth ?) of what happened twenty-five years before. The time line is obscured. We shift constantly between two or more times on every other page, sometimes even on one page. This is a literary trick which some people may find annoying or disconcerting, yet I urge you to stay with the novel. Slowly, the author puts together a picture of an idealistic revolutionary who dissented from nearly everything. The sources tell him of a homosexual dreamer who lived a secretive life in every respect, who had no money, and who was (or wasn't) the inspiration behind the Andean mini-revolt of 1958. "If he had been able to control his sentiments and instincts, he wouldn't have led the double life he led, he wouldn't have had to deal with the intrinsic split between being, by day, a clandestine militant totally given over to the task of changing the world, and, by night, a pervert on the prowl..." We begin to understand Mayta, though some of the interviewees are obviously lying. But Vargas Llosa creates a present (1983) in which Peru is overwhelmed by a Vietnam-like war---invaded by leftwing Cuban and Bolivian forces with Soviet help, who are counterattacked by American marines and airforce. Cuzco is destroyed, the country is collapsing. Though Sendero Luminoso did bring Peru almost to its knees, none of this happened. So can we believe the stories told by everyone about Alejandro Mayta ? Is the story about Mayta years ago true as written by our narrator ? I mean, he's obviously exaggerating even about the present. Suddenly, after a vivid description of the uprising, the narrative ends. The Rashomon-like last 34 pages reveal everything or nothing. We are left with questions, but no answers. Vargas Llosa writes, "Since it is impossible to know what's really happening, we Peruvians lie, invent, dream, and take refuge in illusion. Because of these strange circumstances, Peruvian life, a life in which so few actually do read, has become literary." No matter what you decide, if you live in Peru, you'll have to face the garbage in the streets. In America, it's on TV. There's a lot of garbage around us. Is it in people's minds as well ? Can there be truth ? This is the question this powerful, disturbing book leaves with you. A tour de force.

While this is easily a great book Vargas Llosa's writing style may turn off some. The bouncing between an unnamed author researching Mayta's life and the various characters in the novel was an interesting approach and really added to the confusion of the incidents & people being profiled. It's an incendiary approach & leaves some cold, but I felt his character development was right on & disclosed just enough to get us to the next interview, remembrance, encounter... Mayta's involvement w/ the RWP(T) (Revolutionary Worker's Party [Trotskyist]) is about as fractionated as you can get. This revolutionary group of 7 or so people had to keep breaking ties w/ more "mainstream", sellout groups (you know liked Marxists, Stalinists, Socialists, etc.). So it stands to reason that any book following his endeavors would be equally disjointed. Even the settings add to the effect: Mayta's home, the street he avoids crossing, the mountainous Jauja, the rented room where the RWP(T) has their meetings. All add up to one unifying effect. What great literature does.

Vargas Llosa isn't merely a writer on Latin American politics; he's an exiled Peruvian presidential candidate himself, so his attention to detail is appreciated.

You don't have to be into Latin American politics to enjoy Mayta's mid-century revolutionary endeavors.

I started this book with a slight hesitation. I wasn't so sure if I'd really enjoy a novel about South/Central American politics. What I found instead was a brilliant book that walks the line between invention and reality. The surprise ending of this book is not quite as explosive as the endign to The sixth sense (but almost.) This book is fascinating in the combination of the erotic with the poetic. And then in the last chapter, rather than feeling unforgiving for the fact that I'd been "deceived", I was thrilled that I HAD the wool pulled over my eyes. How? you may ask? I will not say any more. Let's just say that this story on a writer's quest for truth, and the truth as he sees it is a great intoroduction to the works of Vargas Llosa, and one that you won't be able to get out of your mind. Don't be surprised if you find yourself up at night thinking on the myriad plot points. That's when you know a book really was worth your time.

This is definitely an entertaining read, and very funny at that. The (autobiographical?) protagonist, Mario, falls in love with his "aunt" Julia (not a blood relation), the kind of relationship that is the stuff of radio soap operas - meanwhile, Mario's coworker and confidant is the enigmatic and pseudobohemian/pseudointellectual Pedro Camacho, the most popular radio scriptwriter in Peru. The rest of the novel consists of excerpts from Camacho's radio serials interwoven (chapter by chapter) with tales of Mario's scampering about with Julia.

My greatest frustration with the book is that it didn't use the full potential of the blurring of lines between "story" and "reality." Unfortunately, the interplay between "story" and "reality" was billed as the theme of the novel, whose chapters alternate between descriptions of "reality" and descriptions of Camacho's fictional world of radio serials. Camacho's various real-life prejudices - e.g., his vitriol for Argentina and his fears about middle age - do diffuse to the stories, but not in any deep or intriguing way, only for some comic interjections. Similarly, the radio serials are mentioned in conversations in the "real" portions of the novel, but not much is done with them.

I was really hoping for the book's last chapter to be a blend of the main story and the stories of Camacho's serials, but no such luck. Indeed, the final chapter, or maybe two chapters, seemed out of place, and not as clever and humorous as the rest of the novel. I was also hoping for Camacho to play more of a role in the story itself. As it stands, Mario's and Camacho's worlds don't really intersect, except for their meetings at cafes.

For a similar back-and-forth technique between "fictional" and "real," try "Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World," by Haruki Murakami. Or for a hilarious treatment of the making of radio serials, watch the (coincidentally, also Japanese) movie "Welcome Back, Mister McDonald."

In summary, this is an entertaining book, and a good story, but with wasted potential as far as higher literary aspirations; Vargas Llosa executes his clever structural idea quite sloppily.

Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter had been on my "to read" list for awhile. This entertaining and humorous book is about 18 year old Mario who lives with his grandparents in Lima, Peru. He has a large family with lots of aunts, uncles, and cousins. Mario's dream is to be a writer and he works as a news writer for a local radio station, while trying his hand at writing short stories in his spare moments. His Aunt Julia, moves to Lima from Bolivia after her divorce. She is 32 years old and not a blood relation (she is the sister of his uncle's wife). Mario and Julia start spending time together and Mario begins to fall in love with her, which is not something that the rest of their family would appreciate! At the same time, the radio station where Mario works hires a new scriptwriter from Bolivia named Pedro. Pedro writes the scripts and acts in the many radio serials that the station airs. Mario becomes friends with the odd scriptwriter.

The book is written so that alternating chapters tell the story of Mario and his friends and family and the stories in the serials. It is an interesting writing style and reminds me of a few other books that I have read including Blind Assassin by M. Atwood and If on a winter's night... by I. Calvino. I enjoyed this writing style very much and founf the book extermely enjoyable and recommend to anyone who may be looking for a different and light read.

Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter is without a doubt Mario Vargas-Llosa's most entertaining book, intelligent without being difficult and hilarious without being patronizing.

Some of the most subtle points are lost in translation -- "escribidor" in the original title, for example, has a sense of someone simply taking dictation or producing a text by rote compared to the word "scriptwriter" used in the English language version -- but that is the only significant weak point and is not enough to withhold a five-star rating for this wonderful book.

The book's account is semi-autobiographical, with two story lines alternating chapters -- a style employed in several other Vargas Llosa novels -- until they begin to link together like cogs in the gears of the narrative. But it is the way they mesh together that is part of the magic in this book. Without giving away the story line here, let it suffice to say that at certain points you'll find yourself smiling and flipping back through the pages uttering "but didn't he..." or "I thought that..."

The story itself offers a fascinating look at several aspects of life in Peru, one of the most complex and interesting countries in the world. But it does it effortlessly; using a love-torn teenage protagonist, a sexy older woman, an enraged father, an eccentric serial writer, and a compelling cast of misfit radio artists.

Though certain parts (especially the story of Julia) are well documented, the exact extent to which some of the rest of the book is based on real life is still being debated. Every once in a while in Lima, for example, an obituary will mention that its subject was one of the people the unforgettable Pedro Camacho might have been based on, and many old Peruvians have theories about the exact bar or town where certain scenes were set.

Like any writer, Vargas Llosa takes certain artistic license and some people have grumbled about inaccuracies in the text. But I shrug off those complaints: a novel is never meant to be an accurate historical document.

Nonetheless, if you are intrigued enough by the story in Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter to read more and you understand Spanish, the most important and entertaining of the complaints is by Aunt Julia (Julia Urquidi) herself, called Lo Que Varguitas No Dijo (What Little Vargas Didn't Say). She also authored a more academic version of the story in English, My Life With Mario Vargas Llosa.

Death in the Andes is a story of brutality and fear and ignorance. The language is often coarse and vulgar. The ending is especially disturbing. Were it not for the remarkable writing of Mario Vargas Llosa, I might have put this unsettling story aside. But Mario Vargas Llosa is a captivating story teller and I found myself wanting to know more and more about his characters that inhabit the harsh mountains of Peru.

The reader encounters alternating viewpoints and layered conversations that intermingle the present and the past, forcing the reader to remain alert. Death in the Andes is structurally a mystery story in which two soldiers assigned to a barren outpost investigate the disappearance of three men. The brutal Shining Path terrorists (the Senderistas) are the natural suspect, but Corporal Lituma also mistrusts both the townspeople (largely traditional Indians) and the construction work crew building a highway across the mountains. Initially, he has little patience for talk of the pishtacos, vampire-like humans that sucked the blood and ate the melted the fat of their victims.

There are stories within stories. Young French tourists are stoned to death, rather than shot, to save bullets, and to permit others to take part in the killing. In fascination we listen to a lonely young man describe his improbable love of a prostitute. We witness a village turning upon itself and selecting victims for the Senderistas. We meet an aged, repulsive woman who in her youth helped kill a pishtacos. We gain a nebulous understanding as to why Peruvians and foreigners involved in re-forestation programs and nature preserves become prime targets for assassination.

I have already begun to read Death in the Andes again and I am searching for more writings by Mario Vargas Llosa. Although I found his portrait of contemporary Peru to be unsettling, disturbing, and haunting, Death in the Andes will appeal to the reader on many levels. It is a memorable lesson in history, in cultural conflict, and in man's inhumanity.

Mario Vargas Llosa does an excellent job in capturing many of the dilemnas and controversies which face modern Peru in "Death in the Andes". He does an masterful job in presenting the military, insurgents, (Sendero Luminoso), and also the native peasants and farmers of the country. The reader really feels the emotions and experiences of the characters in the story. The violence, brutality and pain of life of many in Peru comes across clearly in this tale. Vargas Llosa weaves the narratives of three characters and also experiments with shifting between different periods of time during the course of the novel. His writing style in this work is very straightforward and clear. The book reads quite quickly and easily. If one enjoys the work of Gabriel García Márquez or a great story in general, they will enjoy "Death in the Andes".

In Death in the Andes, Vargas Llosa weaves a tale that is neither simple nor pat. He reveals truths about human nature: their complexities and frailities in stressful circumstances. People alone in the mountains; people who have lost hope turn to beliefs as old as those same hills and become something horrible. They turn on their neighbors and kill them at the behest of people all too willing to use them for their own ends. The terrucos, serruchos, apus, and pishtacos which liter his story surround the reader in a vast world one cannot explain away as being the rantings of mountain people. Vargas Llosa places the reader into this mysterious world, and it is not always a comfortable one. The Shining Path scenes in this book are, in themselves, enough to make one turn away. But it is worth the read, as simply a lever to pry open that world which I can never really know, even though I've pedaled a bike in the backcountry, and had people yell that I was a "pishtaco" or one who steals the flesh from another to sell, I am not of Peru. Vargas Llosa took me as far I could ever go.