Daughter of Fortune (52 page)

Under the aegis of the Goddess of Love, Isabel Allende uses her storytelling skills brilliantly in
Aphrodite
to evoke the delights of food and sex. After considerable research and study, she has become an authority on aphrodisiacs, which include everything from food and drink to stories and, of course, love. Readers will find here recipes from Allende's mother, poems, stories from ancient and foreign literatures, paintings, personal anecdotes, fascinating tidbits on the sensual art of food and its effects on amorous performance, tips on how to attract your mate and revive flagging virility, passages on the effect of smell on libido, a history of alcoholic beverages, and much more.

“Allende turns the joyous preparation and consumption of fine food into an erotic catalyst.”

—
New York Times Book Review

Selling more than 65,000 copies and topping bestseller lists around the world,
The Infinite Plan
tells the engrossing story of one man's quest for love and for his soul. Gregory Reeves is the son of Charles, an itinerant preacher. As a boy, Gregory accepts the endless journeying and poverty which is his family's lot, never questioning the validity of his father's homespun philosophy of life—the Infinite Plan. But, as manhood approaches, he finds himself possessed by a yearning to escape. Hankering after worldly wealth, he longs to break away from the barrio, the teeming Hispanic ghetto of downtown Los Angeles where his family has finally settled. Gregory's quest, so different from his father's, takes him first to law school at Berkeley, next to the killing fields of Vietnam, then into a headlong (and hedonistic) pursuit of the American Dream.

“Spellbinding. . . . Allende has caught the mood of our spiritually troubled times with uncanny precision and insight.”

—Miami Herald

Isabel Allende evokes the magnificent landscapes of her country; a charming, idiosyncratic Chilean people with a violent history and an indomitable spirit; and the politics, religion, myth, and magic of her homeland that she carries with her even today. The book circles around two life-changing moments. The assassination of her uncle Salvador Allende Gossens on September 11, 1973, sent her into exile and transformed her into a literary writer. And the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, on her adopted homeland, the United States, brought forth an overdue acknowledgment that Allende had indeed left home.
My Invented Country
, mimicking the workings of memory itself, ranges back and forth across that distance between past and present lives. It speaks compellingly to immigrants and to all of us who try to retain a coherent inner life in a world full of contradictions.

“The book gets my undivided attention when it expounds on the relationship of the author to that country of hers, invented, imaginary, fictional, to the story of her family, which is itself invented memory, and to her vocation as a narrator.”

—Los Angeles Times

With an enchanting blend of magical realism, politics, and romance reminiscent of her classic bestseller
The House of the Spirits
, Isabel Allende presents a soul-baring memoir that seizes the reader like a novel of suspense. Written for her daughter Paula when she became ill and slipped into a coma,
Paula
is the colorful story of Allende's life—from her early years in her native Chile, through the turbulent military coup of 1973, to the subsequent dictatorship and her family's years of exile. In the telling, bizarre ancestors reveal themselves, delightful and bitter childhood memories surface, enthralling anecdotes of youthful years are narrated, and intimate secrets are softly whispered.

In an exorcism of death and a celebration of life, Isabel Allende explores the past, questions the gods, and creates a magical book that carries the reader from tears to laughter, from terror to sensuality to wisdom. In
Paula
, readers will come to understand that the miraculous world of her novels is the world Isabel Allende inhabits—it is her enchanted reality.

“Spellbinding. . . . In flawlessly rich prose [Allende] shares with us her most intimate feelings.”

—
Washington Post Book World

City of the Beasts
is Isabel Allende's first novel for children—an eco-thriller in which fifteen-year-old Alexander Cold has the chance to take the trip of a lifetime. Parting from his family and ill mother, Alexander joins his fearless grandmother, a magazine reporter for
International Geographic
, on an expedition to the dangerous, remote world of the Amazon. Their mission, along with the others on their team—including a celebrated anthropologist, a local guide and his young daughter Nadia, and a doctor—is to document the legendary Yeti of the Amazon known as the Beast. Under the dense canopy of the jungle, Alexander is amazed to discover much more than he could have imagined about the hidden worlds of the rain forest. Drawing on the strength of the Jaguar, the totemic animal Alexander finds within himself, and the Eagle, Nadia's spirit guide, both young people are led by the invisible People of the Mist on a thrilling and unforgettable journey to the ultimate discovery.

“Allende's writing is so vivid we hear the sounds, see the bright birds, smell and even taste the soft fruit.”

—
The Times
(London)

Not many months have passed since teenager Alexander Cold followed his bold grandmother into the heart of the Amazon to uncover its legendary Beast. This time reporter Kate Cold escorts her grandson and his closest friend, Nadia, along with the photographers from
International Geographic
on a journey to another remote niche of the world, in the Himalayas. The team's task is to locate its fabled golden dragon, a sacred statue and priceless oracle that can foretell the future of the kingdom.

In their scramble to reach the statue before it is destroyed by the greed of an outsider, Alexander and Nadia must use the transcendent power of their totemic animal spirits—Jaguar and Eagle. With the aid of a sage Buddhist monk, his young royal disciple, and a fierce tribe of Yeti warriors, Alexander and Nadia fight to protect the holy rule of the golden dragon.

“Imagining this utopian land and animating Buddhist beliefs is clearly fun for Allende, and her joy translates onto the page.”

—San Francisco Chronicle

Alexander Cold knows all too well his grandmother Kate is never far from an adventure. When
International Geographic
commissions her to write an article about the first elephant-led safaris in Africa, they head—with Nadia Santos and the magazine's photography crew—to the blazing, red plains of Kenya. Days into the tour, a Catholic missionary approaches their camp in search of his companions who have mysteriously disappeared. Kate, Alexander, Nadia, and their team, agreeing to aid the rescue, enlist the help of a local pilot to lead them to the swampy forests of Ngoubé. There they discover a clan of Pygmies who unveil a harsh and surprising world of corruption, slavery, and poaching. Alexander and Nadia, entrusting the magical strengths of Jaguar and Eagle, their totemic animal spirits, launch a spectacular and precarious struggle to restore freedom and return leadership to its rightful hands.

“Captures the romance of exotic travel. . . . Has at least two things Allende's adult fiction is known for: passion and politics.”

—Philadelphia Inquirer

Three Allende titles are available in Spanish only, from Rayo, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers
: Cuentos de Eva Luna, De Amor y de Sombra,
and
La Casa de Los Espiritus.

The House of the Spirits

Of Love and Shadows

Eva Luna

The Stories of Eva Luna

The Infinite Plan

Paula

Aphrodite: A Memoir of the Senses

Daughter of Fortune

Portrait in Sepia