Violeta

Violeta begins to see Dr. Levy, a psychiatrist, to sort out her emotionally destructive dependence on Julián. With his help and intensive introspective work, she finally leaves Julián. She refuses to sort out or finance any of his business affairs or debts, asserts she will no longer stay with him in Miami, demands that he treat Juan Martin with respect when he comes to visit, and warns him against ever laying a hand on her again.

Julián eventually hired Zoraida to manage his illegal businesses. An accountant by trade, Zoraida is an even better fit for Julián than Violeta. Zoraida is also a blessing for Violeta, helping her cut her last emotional ties to Julián. The two women stay in touch, Zoraida occasionally calling to update Violeta on the latest drama or ask her for advice. With her extensive knowledge of Julián’s business dealings, Zoraida believes she has him in the palm of her hand, and he will eventually marry her.

Julián begins to visit the country more on missions for Colonia Esperanza. Juan Martin, who fundamentally disagrees with his father, avoids him—the Socialist president in power is someone Juan Martin tirelessly campaigned for. Julián warns Violeta that their son ought to be careful, as the US will not allow this government to last; when the Socialists are finally overthrown, it will be a “bloodbath.”

After not having seen Nieves for a while, Roy tracks her down and finds her unresponsive after a heroin overdose; he calls Julián, and the men rush her to a hospital, saving her life. Following this, Julián has Nieves forcibly admitted to a rehab clinic in Miami; Violeta flies down to be near her daughter. Three months in, Nieves disappears from the clinic, and even Roy is unable to find her for a while.

In these months, Violeta also remains in close contact with José Antonio, who keeps her abreast of the situation back home. In general, the political situation in the 1970s is terrible, with rampant disagreement amongst the parties, and the constant pushback from the right-wing, backed by the American CIA. However, José Antonio and Violeta remain largely unaffected: The Socialist president sets up a public housing program, and Rustic Homes wins the bid to build the new houses. Despite the government contract, the Del Valles are still viewed as enemies of the Socialist government, being business owners. Violeta votes Conservative, following her brother’s lead, and the only people she knows who are left-leaning are Juan Martin and Josephine.

Juan Martin, who is studying journalism at university, is deeply interested in politics, and horrified by his mother’s political stance, quoting the rampant poverty and inequality in the country. Violeta doesn’t believe there is anything she can or should do about these issues; she confesses she may have continued thinking this way throughout the dictatorship to follow, “if the iron fist of oppression hadn’t dealt (her) a direct blow” (185).

Violeta spends three years traveling between Miami, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles. After Nieves disappears, Violeta spends months looking for her, until Roy finally finds her in Las Vegas. Nieves is living on the streets, indulging in stealing and sex work to support herself and her addiction. Julián invites Nieves to stay with him and Violeta at a hotel in Las Vegas, but Nieves disappears again a week later, after stealing money and Violeta’s passport. With Roy’s help, Julián has Nieves kidnapped and admitted to a psychiatric ward in a hospital in Utah, where Nieves is put in a straitjacket in a padded room.

Julián goes back to Miami, but Violeta insists on staying close to Nieves, and goes to Utah with Roy where they check into a bed-and-breakfast. Violeta visits the facility every day despite the fact that she is not allowed to see Nieves, and the center cannot release information about Nieves without Julián’s sign-off. In this time, Roy and Violeta grow close and eventually begin a relationship.

Nieves disappears again from the center 17 days later, leaving a note that her father should stop trying to find her. The medical professionals at the center explain how they initially used sedatives to help Nieves through her withdrawal symptoms, following which they began rest and relaxation sessions and group therapy. They conclude that Nieves is “emotionally immature” and “vacillating between love and hate for her father” (195); as soon as they began exploring her childhood and adolescence trauma, she ran away.

Julián loses his temper when he hears this and leaves, but Violeta stays on to listen to the rest of the medical information. Nieves has had multiple abortions and showed symptoms of malnutrition and osteoporosis; she also needed antibiotic treatment for cystitis and STIs. Julián wants to look for her again, but Roy refuses this time, saying that Julián has no authority over Nieves anymore. Grieving and frustrated, Julián leaves for Miami, while Violeta returns to Sacramento.

Back home, José Antonio and Josephine update Violeta on the situation in the country: There is growing unrest and protests against the government, fueled by propaganda spread against it by the right. Juan Martin, however, takes Violeta to visit a poor neighborhood where the president is revered as a saint for the work he has done. He also introduces her to and tells her about people who Violeta considers like herself, who have voted for this government—students, professionals, even friends and family from aristocratic circles.

Roy calls Violeta and asks her to come to Los Angeles; he has found Nieves but asks Violeta not to tell Julián. The last time Roy kidnapped Nieves, he snuck his card into her purse, in case she ever needed to call someone for help; she reached out to him some time ago, and Roy set her up in the house of a friend, Rita Linares, a Mexican woman in Los Angeles. A widow, with children spread across the country she rarely sees, Rita was happy to take Nieves in.

When Violeta arrives at Rita’s house, she discovers that Nieves is pregnant; she has stopped using drugs, deciding she wants to keep the baby, and is looking healthier than before. Nieves is glad to see Violeta and tells her about her life recently. After she decided to keep the baby, she ran out of money as she stopped soliciting for sex work or selling drugs. She began to stay at churches and women’s shelters in rotation, but it got tougher for her to do so as her pregnancy advanced. She eventually called Roy on a whim; when she asked Roy about Joe Santoro, Roy didn’t know anything, which won Nieves’s trust. Santoro had been shot dead in the back of the head, and Nieves believes Julián responsible, although Violeta refuses to believe this.

José Antonio takes over Violeta’s business so she can stay on in Los Angeles; only he, Josephine, and Juan Martin know about Nieves. Roy takes care of them, visiting often and taking them out for meals. Violeta repairs her bond with her daughter. Nieves has no plans for what she will do after the baby is born; she only knows she will name it Camilo if it’s a boy and Camila if it’s a girl.

One day in October, Nieves wakes up with a headache. Her water breaks and she is rushed to the hospital; however, her headache doesn’t cease, and her blood pressure is through the roof. An emergency cesarean section is carried out, but the doctors are unable to manage Nieves’s eclampsia, and she dies shortly after her son’s birth. Violeta recounts to Camilo the deep grief she experienced upon his mother’s passing, and the promise she made to be everything he ever needed.

Born in the US, Camilo is a US citizen, and Violeta cannot take him out of the country. Roy registers himself as the baby’s father and hands over guardianship to Violeta, who later registers Camilo for dual citizenship. When Julián is told about Nieves, he is beside himself with grief, and Violeta hears him sob for the first time. Six weeks after Camilo is born, Violeta takes him to Sacramento; the work of caring for him helps transform her loss and grief into the joy and purpose of nurturing a new life.

Facunda tells Violeta about the agrarian reforms which appropriate the lands surrounding Santa Clara. Fabian’s father closes his dairy, refusing to bow to the government’s mandate. There are also rumors circling about Colonia Esperanza; a journalist’s undercover report paints it as a group of foreigners “(living) beyond the law and (posing) a threat to national security” (211). Julián, who is piloting unregistered private flights there, refuses to talk about what he is transporting.

Juan Martin, who is close to graduating, is named president of the students’ association, and frequently appears on TV as a student representative, talking about revolutionary ideas, but in a conciliatory tone. Eleven months after Camilo’s birth, a military coup overthrows the government; it is a bloodbath, as Julián predicted. The military takes over the country, which goes into complete lockdown for three days; communication is difficult with both Juan Martin in the city and José Antonio, who lives just a few miles away. Julián, however, who is busy with work for government agencies, moves about unimpeded.

After the lockdown is lifted, Josephine visits Violeta and reveals that the military raided Juan Martin’s university and arrested students, particularly those studying sociology and journalism; Juan Martin is on the banned list. He managed to escape to José Antonio’s house, and doesn’t think Julián will help hide him, as he believes his father is complicit with the government.

Violeta begs Julián for help in transporting Juan Martin to Santa Clara from Sacramento. Julián initially refuses, but eventually agrees begrudgingly; he organizes a travel permit, and Juan Martin is smuggled out of Sacramento disguised as a woman, with fake papers identifying him as Camilo’s nanny, “Lorena Benítez.” Juan Martin tells Violeta he has not turned himself in, as the government is urging people to do, as those who have been arrested tend to disappear.

Facunda, Torito, and Facunda’s eldest granddaughter, Etelvina “Tina” Muñoz, welcome Violeta, Juan Martin, and Camilo at Santa Clara. Juan Martin tells them about the cursory trials, arbitrary executions, concentration camps, and tortures undergone by detainees, as Violeta listens in horror. She slowly begins to understand that the country is not as democratic and peaceful as she believed, and not everything she has heard can be chalked up to Communist propaganda. The night after Juan Martin’s arrival, Torito and Juan Martin set out from the farm, the former helping smuggle Juan Martin safely across national borders.

Violeta spends almost two weeks at Santa Clara, waiting for news of Juan Martin and Torito. Facunda, meanwhile, brings news from Nahuel that soldiers rounded up a group of tenant farms not far from the farm and took them away in military trucks; no one knows what happened to them. While Violeta waits, a Norwegian man named Harald Fiske turns up at the farm, asking to use their telephone. Harald is a Norwegian diplomat stationed in Holland, with his wife and children. He loves the Latin American countryside, and visits Violeta’s country every year to birdwatch. Violeta and Facunda ask him to stay at the farm for his safety, as the area is overrun by soldiers using violence at the slightest provocation.

Yaima arrives eventually with news that Torito was taken by the soldiers; there was no one else with him, and Violeta hopes this means that Juan Martin was able to escape, but she is sick with worry for both men. She calls Julián to ask for help, but even he is unable to speak freely on the phone and comes to Santa Clara instead. This alerts Violeta to the terrors of the Fascist regime they are now under.

Julián claims he is unable to get any information about Juan Martin and Torito, but Violeta doesn’t believe him; he makes a mocking comment about Juan Martin dancing the tango in Buenos Aires, which convinces Violeta that Julián is hiding something. She returns to Sacramento with Camilo and Etelvina, the latter helping take care of the young boy, and Violeta continues helping José Antonio with the business. In the years she spends in misery regarding Juan Martin’s fate, Camilo is her only consolation, a mischievous child who takes up a great deal of energy and attention.

Violeta doesn’t dwell on the dictatorship in her recollections, noting enough is known now about the concentration camps, murders, and torture that went on during the regime. During the dictatorship, however, these were merely rumors. On the surface, the country appeared to be prosperous and disciplined, albeit under the fist of repression; one had to be careful what one discussed openly, and with whom.

José Antonio has a heart attack and has to stay home, so Violeta and Anton, Marko’s son, run the business together. They eventually sell it, so José Antonio can spend his final years in peace. Violeta moves to the city, where she turns to buying, renovating, and selling properties, making most of her fortune. Camilo, Etelvina, and Violeta live in a huge apartment, which eventually José Antonio and Josephine also move into, when José Antonio’s failing heart demands better medical care than available in Sacramento.

These years are the hardest of the dictatorship, but are relatively good ones for Violeta, excepting her anxiety regarding Juan Martin and Torito. She reclaims her childhood closeness with Josephine, enjoys Camilo’s childhood, and even makes trips to the US to see Roy, while Etelvina manages the household. Julián loves Camilo in his own way—the child bored him, but he makes up his absence in enthusiasm, by buying the boy gifts and teaching him everything Juan Martin wouldn’t learn: shooting, archery, boxing, and so on. Julián buys Camilo a puppy, which grows into a huge, black dog, christened Crispín. Crispín sleeps by Camilo every night until the latter is eventually sent away to San Ignacio, a boarding school.

Violeta spends four years waiting for news of Juan Martin, until finally learning that he is in Argentina, working as a journalist with false identification and a pen name. He has not messaged her, as he doesn’t want his father to learn his whereabouts.

Just as Juan Martin is settling in Argentina, a military coup arrives in Argentina as well. Under Operation Condor, thousands of people are kidnapped and disappear. Unlike in Violeta’s country, the repression doesn’t occur overnight, but takes place surreptitiously for years. Julián once drunkenly confesses to transporting military prisoners, bound and gagged.

Juan Martin’s friends are journalists, artists, and intellectuals, who share the same politics as him; among them is Vania Helperin, a Jewish Holocaust survivor whose brother is a member of Montoneros, a guerrilla organization hunted by the government. Vania is arrested, presumably for information on her brother; other friends of Juan Martin’s are also arrested, and Juan Martin’s editor warns him that people are looking for him, too.

Juan Martin goes into hiding, seeking asylum at the Norwegian embassy. He eventually learns that Vania was killed, her body identified by her parents at a morgue. Heartbroken, Juan Martin leaves for Norway with identification papers provided by the embassy. Harald, who has been stationed in Argentina for the past year following his divorce, arrives at Violeta’s shortly after, with a letter from her son written in code.

Upon Juan Martin’s arrival in the country, the Norwegian Refugee Council, established after World War II, helps Juan Martin out by setting him up with accommodation, clothes, and money for basic expenses, teaching him how to navigate the city, and putting him in touch with other Latin American refugees. When Violeta finally reunites with him a year later, Juan Martin is working as a translator and has adapted to his new life. Violeta meets Ulla, a Norwegian girl whom Juan Martin eventually marries. He does much better in his new, adopted country, turning alien and foreign to his country, and even his family.

José Antonio develops dementia, and dies a few years later, aged 80. Josephine follows him a year later, having battled cancer for a long time. Camilo discovers her when he returns from school one day, seated perfectly still in a chair with Crispín’s head in her lap.