Easy, entertaining read - characters a bit frustrating

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	• Zorro: A Novel Isabel Allende, 2005 - 400 pages average customer review:based on 125 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

El Zorro, Romantic and Honorable

I confess I have superhero ambitions. I am attracted to anyone having the fashion sense and BMI to pull off wearing tights and a cape in public and I want to be just like them when I grow up. The consummate altruism that comes along with the costume is an ideal I can only hope to achieve. Paragons of this race come along only once in a generation.

When Isabel Allende wrote El Zorro, I knew I had to read it. Zorro may not be the type of superhero that has a bat cave or changes clothes in a phone booth, but he's still a superhero of the most romantic kind.

Impatiently I waited for it to come out in paperback. Seeing it paraded in front of me constantly over the next few months, I broke down and bought it in hardcover, an honor normally reserved for books I plan to read over and over. It turns out that the investment was prudent. I recently reread this wonderful story. It was just as good the second time around.

The author herself is almost as interesting as her characters. Like El Zorro Diego de la Vega, Allende has noble roots. Like Diego de la Vega, she was essentially exiled to Spain as a young adult. Perhaps it was inevitable that she would write the story of the Fox. Even in translation, Allende writes beautifully. Although she lives in California, she writes in her native Spanish.

El Zorro explores the creation of not just a folk hero, but of the boy, Diego de la Vega, who grew up to become el Zorro. Spanning two continents and four decades, there is never a lull in the story. The swordplay is really cool, too.

Zorro's parents meet at a Spanish Mission. His father, Alejandro de la Vega, is the brilliant young officer charged with the mission's defense. His mother, Toypurnia, is the daughter of White Owl, a shaman and healer of the Gabrieleno tribe, and a Spanish sailor who deserted his ship and lived among the Indians.

Toypurnia is injured in an attack she leads on the San Gabriel mission. When the Spaniards discover that she is a woman, she is given medical treatment. Alejandro de la Vega is fascinated by her and often tends to her himself. She and Alejandro fall in love and rather than allow her to be executed as a captured enemy, Alejandro maneuvers Toypurnia into the protection of Doña Eulalia de Callís, the wife of the governor of Alta California, who, as a condition of Toypurnia's pardon, turns her into a "Christian Spanish lady" newly christened "Regina María de la Inmaculada Concepción." Alejandro and Toypurnia are married and inherit a grand estate when Doña Eulalia and her husband, Governor Pedro Fages, decide to return to Spain.

When Toypurnia seems to have failing health during her pregnancy with Diego, an unmarried pregnant Catholic Indian woman is sent from the San Gabriel Mission to be her servant. The two women give birth the same day, but since Toypurnia's health continues to decline the servant nurses both Diego and her own son, Bernardo. Diego and Bernardo come to be more than milk brothers, though. They are the best of friends and when Bernardo's mother is killed during a pirate raid on the family's compound, they are raised as true brothers. Bernardo is so traumatized by seeing his mother murdered by the marauders, though, that he becomes mute.

Bernardo is the perfect foil for Diego's personality. He is smart, strong, silent, sturdy, and unassailably loyal to his brother. Diego, on the other hand, is small, mischievous, brilliant, witty, and the instigator of most of the trouble the boys find.

Diego's Indian grandmother, White Owl, exerts as much influence on the course of the boys' lives as do the Spaniards who raise them. She takes the boys on shamanistic journeys of survival and character development. On a survival vision quest Bernardo finds his spirit animal, the horse Tornado, and Diego finds his totem, the fox. "Like the fox, you will discover what cannot be seen in the dark, you will disguise yourself, and you will hide by day and act by night," his grandmother explains after the vision quest.

Diego is sent to Barcelona, to the home of his father's best friend, to be educated. Naturally Bernardo accompanies him, ostensibly as a servant but in actuality Bernardo is educated the same as Diego. The Spanish household accepts the boys without reservation. He and Bernardo reach their adult growth there. As political intrigues permeate the Barcelona, Diego and Bernardo find themselves getting involved to preserve their own reputations as well as those of their patron. El Zorro, a masked and mustachioed liberator of political captives, is born due to the necessity of acting in secret.

The political climate in Barcelona becomes dire and Diego and Bernardo are entrusted with the safety of his patron's beautiful daughters. They escape back to America, encountering the famous pirates Pierre and Jean Lafitte in the process. Their return to Alta California does not improve their circumstances. The political climate there is at least as bad as it was in Barcelona. El Zorro has a need to continue to act. The Zorro we are all familiar with becomes the legend we love.

Allende's El Zorro embodies the melding of many different aspects of society into one conflicted and heroic personality. El Zorro becomes a legend because he has no choice given his integrity his complex background. Loyalties that should be divided find a simple resolution simply by doing what is right. Diego is of three worlds: Indian, Californio, and Spain. El Zorro cannot fail because of his wit and his friends and family.

The elements that make el Zorro a hero and a legend are the elements that create any true legend: mystery, physical prowess, masterful wit, and above all else, honor.

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Easy, entertaining read - characters a bit frustrating

Three and a half stars. ***1/2

This was an easy read following the creation of Zorro from Diego de la Vega's childhood up to his first full adventure as Zorro in California. Unlike Allende's other books, it was more for entertainment than serious thought on a certain era of time and it felt like she just had a lot of fun writing it.

Although called "Zorro", the real focus is on the women who helped him become Zorro. Out of the books I've read by her, it was the first time I saw her have a man as her principal character which I think she struggled with a bit. Hence, her using the women's roles (her forte) to save her.

Anyway, I really enjoyed following the characters (although I could have slapped Juliana around a bit -- okay, I could have slapped a lot of them) on their wild ride to Zorro's creation.

I couldn't put the book down as her writing was quite gripping and certainly kept me entertained (beautifully written scenery and swashbuckling adventures!) but it wasn't as intellectually satisfying as her other works. For this, I'd recommend the book to seasoned Allende readers but not first timers. This is not a reflection of her usual work (except in terms of her ease in prose) and so beginners would be best introduced to her earlier works.

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Super Reader

Not too bad, although Allende is clearly not that great an action/adventure writer. The first part of the book should be called 'The Unhappy mother of the boy who it looks like will become Zorro'. Included in this are a few Tom Sawyer type adventures for him and his mate.

Points for this though : they get attacked by pirates while ON THEIR RANCH! That is novel. Once they get to Spain, it becomes more interesting, as the boy is old enough for some serious escapades, and the identity of Zorro comes out.

After some Napoleonic induced problems there he and his female entourage return to yankeeland and there you get the full on Zorro feel. I think she was perhaps getting the hang of it a bit more by then.

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Breathing life into the Legend

Now, I have the original Zorro novel, "Curse of Capistrano", and although all the basic elements are in there, the character of Zorro was truly brought into being by Douglas Fairbanks. His silent 'Mark of Zorro' established everything we know about the character, right down to his now-iconic look. Now, Isabel Allende takes the last step: making this pulp fiction character seem like a flesh and blood human being. Her Zorro is viewed through the sometimes jaundiced eye of the narrator, coming off as both a true hero and at the same time, an overgrown adolescent who likes playing dress-up and swashing his buckle. He seems more human than ever, rather than just an invincible hero who triumphs because his cause is just. I was a bit startled at first by the idea of Zorro's mother as an 'Indian' who barely tolerates her husband's white man's world, as it seemed like having Zorro really close and in tight with the natives is just a tad Lone Ranger, you know, but it works within the context of the book. I guess I'm more used to Mrs. Diego from the Tyrone Power remake of the movie, as just another senora, wife of the Don. This is a stronger and more interesting portrayal. I particularly appreciate the handling of genuine historical events and settings, which lends an extra verisimilitude. All in all, I've read this thing three times in less than two months, and it just made me hungry for more Zorro. Sorry, Antonio Banderas, but this is the real deal.

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My new favorite book!

This book was amazing! Allende has a true gift for story telling as she keeps you interested even though there isn't very much suspence. This book is about zorro's childhood, and is not like the movie at all. The wrting is as if the author were sitting across from you and is smooth and seemless.

reviews: 1, 2, page 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

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