Luiz Ruffato: O verão tardio (Late Summer)

The latest addition to my website is Luiz Ruffato‘s O verão tardio (Late Summer). Our hero/narrator is Oseias Moretto Nunes. Like the author, he was born in Cataguases, a small town in Minas Gerais. He had lived in São Paulo but is now divorced, estranged from his son, out of a job and seemingly dying. The novel is about his return to Cataguases, where he tries, not very successfully, to reconnect with his family and people he knew many years ago. Of his four siblings, one is dead and the others barely talk to one another. The town is hot and subject to flooding. Crime, poverty and drugs are rife. He wanders around the town reminiscing about his not very happy childhood, meeting his three surviving siblings and a few others he knew. Virtually no-one is happy. Marriages have broken up or are unhappy. One sibling is rich and miserable, one poor and miserable and one in-between and miserable. There is no happy ending either for Oseias or, it would seem, for anyone else. Ruffato tells his tale well but I do hope he is happier.

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