Lead Review

• Book: Songs for the Flames
• Location: Colombia, Spain
• Author: Anne McLean (Translator), Juan Gabriel Vásquez

Review Author: Tina Hartas

All of the stories in this collection are human, moral and universal in scope even as they are seated in the mundane existence of lives that are perhaps not that remarkable.

‘The Last Corrido’ is a moving tale of a young man and his uncle, both lead singers, told through the eyes of a writer on tour in Spain with a Mexican band while he tries to decide where next to live his life. Photographer Jay in ‘Woman on the Riverbank’ provides a compelling depiction of buried memories, memories etched in the landscape and in the people. The past and the present are impeccably interwoven in ‘Frogs’. And the painful and unanticipated consequences of cowardice are explored in ‘The Double’. In ‘The Boys’, Vásquez follows a group of teenagers from a gated housing estate as they do what all boys do, escape, run amok and fight. The story is set against the backdrop of drug cartels and murdered judges and as the boys decide to fight with another group instead of each other, Vásquez shows the natural perpetuation of cycles of violence, along with the bravado, the lies and the coverups. The final story, ‘Songs for the Flames’ is a beautifully told and centres on a writer’s search for an obscure dictionary published in 1887, composed by journalist, lawyer and general in the liberal party rebel army Rafael Uribe Uribe. The search for this book leads the writer to an unexpected discovery.

Vásquez’s unflinching and detached style sits well alongside the unimaginable brutality of Colombian history, past and recent. I enjoyed the author’s use of the short story form with its economy of language. Eloquent and haunting, this collection offers a profound sense of place in the fewest words.

These stories provide essential insights, especially into life in Colombia, the struggles, the culture, the seemingly inescapable violence. Here is an example of what the short story is meant to do, land a punch, no matter how hard or soft, and leave the reader pondering, still entranced, long after the last word. Vásquez is an author whose psyche is seated in his native Colombia and as he lives and breathes its bloody history, he casts a spotlight on its subtleties and bitter ironies, delving into the cracks to compose stories of relevance.

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