Zorro

Whenever I go on vacation I try to bring a book that somehow relates to my destination. So when we went to Mexico a couple weeks ago (look for pictures on the fam website soon!) I was in the market for anything set in Mexico, written by a Mexican author, or at least had loose ties to something hispanic, and I settled on Isabel Allende's latest novel, Zorro. Even though Allende is a peruvian raised in Chile, and the book is set in California and Spain, there were actually some direct ties to our vacation. For example, the characters spend some time in the Caribbean--we were on the Yucatan peninsula--and I saw a restaurant named after the famed pirate Jean LaFitte, who makes quite an impression late in the novel. So that was enough to satisfy the geeky compulsion to read books that coincide with my surroundings.

Zorro is about young Diego de la Vega, his formative years and how he became the legendary masked crusader. It's a pretty fun story with lots of colorful characters, exciting adventures and ties to real history. It's an impressive re-imagining of the legend, and it's pretty fast-paced so it didn't get boring. I really liked that the author worked some strong female characters into Zorro's backstory, and she provided some insightful glimpses into social customs of the day and cultural conflicts between the old and new worlds. The best thing about the book is probably the richness of detail--it's very easy to picture everything as it happens.

But... I was still pretty glad to be done reading this book. I enjoyed it quite a lot at first, but after a while it started to seem really dorky. I don't know why, exactly. Sometimes the writing is kind of clumsy--maybe that's all it was. (At one point I began to wonder if I just thought that House of Spirits was a well-written book, because this one really didn't seem up to the standard that I remembered. But no, I really think this one comes off more amateurish). Anyway I still recommend it if you just want something light and fun. It's good, but not great.