The story of Maita

About the book: Maita's story represents a new direction in the works of Vargas Yusa, as we see the Peruvian novelist himself as a character participating in writing the novel we read and developing its course. The novelist's character, which gathers testimonies that form the structure of the novel, reveals to us in the end that the real facts are completely different and much poorer than fictional narration, thus confirming the saying that the novel can be richer and more convincing than history. In a devastated country subjected to an external invasion, and sinking into miserable social and economic conditions, overshadowed by the darkness of the unknown, the novelist—through multiple testimonies—seeks to reconstruct the story of a revolutionary fighter named Alejandro Maita, the hero of a frustrating revolutionary attempt in 1958, and later imprisoned several times under ambiguous circumstances. At the end of this long investigation, the confrontation with reality places this fictional story in its precise place. It is a bitter and tragicomedy view of revolutionary extremism and nostalgia for the struggle. Author: Mario Vargas Yusa. Year of publication: 2018. Number of pages: 400.