Paradise - Softcover

In this ingenious satire, Solita, the not quite ten-year-old daughter of refugees from Franco's Spain, is whisked from the urban ghetto of Galmeda to El Topaz, the lush hacienda of a wealthy eccentric, which her mother assures her will be paradise. But behind its beautiful fa ade, El Topaz is a quagmire of social subterfuge, from its politicking adults to its spiteful children, and Solita finds herself alone in a glittery world where "you couldn't trust anything. Or anybody. You had to navigate completely on your own."

Nominated for the 1990 National Book Award, here is the impressive literary debut of an acclaimed new Latin American talent. Ten-year-old Solita serves as the insightful narrator of this exquisitely written, richly imagined novel of the politics, pretentions and amours of Latin America's wealthy.