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Daughter of Fortune

(Oprah's Book Club)

By Isabel Allende

(57)

| Hardcover | 9780060194918

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Book Description

Orphaned at birth, Eliza Sommers is raised in the British colony of Valparaíso, Chile, by the well-intentioned Victorian spinster Miss Rose and her more rigid brother Jeremy. Just as she meets and falls in love with the wildly inappropriate Joaquín Andieta, a lowly clerk who works for Jeremy, golContinue

Orphaned at birth, Eliza Sommers is raised in the British colony of Valparaíso, Chile, by the well-intentioned Victorian spinster Miss Rose and her more rigid brother Jeremy. Just as she meets and falls in love with the wildly inappropriate Joaquín Andieta, a lowly clerk who works for Jeremy, gold is discovered in the hills of northern California. By 1849, Chileans of every stripe have fallen prey to feverish dreams of wealth. Joaquín takes off for San Francisco to seek his fortune, and Eliza, pregnant with his child, decides to follow him.

So begins Isabel Allende's enchanting new novel, Daughter of Fortune, her most ambitious work of fiction yet. As we follow her spirited heroine on a perilous journey north in the hold of a ship to the rough-and-tumble world of San Francisco and northern California, we enter a world whose newly arrived inhabitants are driven mad by gold fever. A society of single men and prostitutes among whom Eliza moves--with the help of her good friend and savior, the Chinese doctor Tao Chien--California opens the door to a new life of freedom and independence for the young Chilean. Her search for the elusive Joaquín gradually turns into another kind of journey that transforms her over time, and what began as a search for love ends up as the conquest of personal freedom. By the time she finally hears news of him, Eliza must decide who her true love really is.

Daughter of Fortune is a sweeping portrait of an era, a story rich in character, history, violence, and compassion. In Eliza, Allende has created one of her most appealing heroines, an adventurous, independent-minded, and highly unconventional young woman who has the courage to reinvent herself and to create her own destiny in a new country. A marvel of storytelling, Daughter of Fortune confirms once again Isabel Allende's extraordinary gift for fiction and her place as one of the world's leading writers.

Critics

  • Rags from riches

    Expansive might be one word to describe Isabel Allende's new novel, which aspires to the dubious condition of historical saga despite taking place over a period of only 10 years. The complex plot, the wilfully unusual characters and their outlandish ... (read full critics)

    guardian.co.uk published on Sat, 25 Sep 2010

  • Daughter of Fortune

    Before a recent reading from her novel Daughter of Fortune, Isabel Allende remarked that the act of writing had helped her on a "journey through the shadows" after the death of her daughter from a rare illness several years ago. While one can appreci ... (read full critics)

    raintaxi published on Fri, 3 Sep 2010

5 Reviews

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  • 1 person find this helpful

    Where there's a will, there's a way

    In the way of love there must be knowledge and ignorance so I have become both a dullard and a sage.

    Is this helpful?

    Turpentine said on May 17, 2011 | Add your feedback

  • It made me fall in love with Chili. I was already in love with California.

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    jelabino said on Mar 14, 2010 | Add your feedback

  • Gimme a bit knowledge about Chile and China in 1840s and the Gold rush. One sentence in the book sticks in my mind: " ... falling in love not with Joaquin Andieta, but with the idea of falling in love ..."

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    xYang said on Mar 5, 2009 | Add your feedback

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9780060194918 Hardcover $26.00 -- The Book Depository
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