Aura by Carlos Fuentes. The author was often named as a likely candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature. This book is magic –or perhaps more accurately– it is written and experienced as a dream. This short novel is about Felipe Montero, a historian that is hired to translate and to put together a memoir of General Llorente who died a long time ago. Llorente’s widow hires Montero to come to her house to live with her while he works on the memoir, and when he comes to the house he establishes a relationship with Consuelo’s niece, Aura.
Montrerio and Aura develop a relationship which turns into love and sex. Later on, Montero slightly realizes there is something odd about Aura and Consuelo. As the time goes one the two women start to seem more and more alike to each other. As Monterio reads and translates Llorente’s documents and discovers old photographs, he realizes he and Llorente are physically identical as well. At the end of the novel Montero realizes he and Llorente are the same person. What seems to happen in the novel is that Consuelo transcended time to bring Montero back to the past.
This is a strange novel. Not only because of the mystic and dark atmosphere, and how the characters mix their temporal frames but also because of the way the author chooses to do the narrative. The author involves the reader into the novel and it feels like capturing the story from the narrator point of view. I believe this is one of those books that is hard to make into a movie picture, as this novel relies on the reader’s participation and imagination. This book makes a deep connection with the reader’s mind.