Weekly Reader: Luz Book I: Comings and Goings (Troubled Times) by Luis Gonzalez; Haunting, Beautiful, At Times Satiric Magical Realism About God's Only Begotten Daughter

 

Weekly Reader: Luz Book I: Comings and Goings (Troubled Times) by Luis Gonzalez; Haunting, Beautiful, At Times Satiric Magical Realism About God's Only Begotten Daughter

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Okay, so I reviewed a trip to Heaven with Melia in Foreverland by Thomas Milhorat. I reviewed a trip through Purgatory and Hell with Rotary Pug by Michael Honig. Why not review a  rewrite of the Gospels with God fathering an Only Begotten Daughter almost 2,000 years after begetting his Only Begotten Son?

Luis Gonzalez's Luz is a haunting and beautiful magical realism novel in the tradition of Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Paulo Coelho. It is also at times a dark comic satire that mocks Christianity but ends up being a sincere faith driven novel.

Clara, the protagonist, lives in 1994 Cuba, a country consumed by the Communist dictatorship of Fidel Castro. Clara and her husband, Rigo are fed up with the shortages, surveillance, jobs that go nowhere, and Castro's totalitarianism. When friends of theirs suggest that they get on one of the boats to America, Rigo is reluctant but Clara is adamant. After some convincing, Rigo agrees but under two conditions: they move to San Francisco (Rigo is an architect and that city hosts some of the most beautiful buildings. He wants to work on them.) and there is no turning back. Once decided, they do not change their minds.

 Things work out well, until Clara receives a vision from an erudite and somewhat snooty angel, Gabriel. Gabriel has a message, similar to his original one to the Virgin Mary. God has found favor with her and she will give birth to a daughter. Oh yeah, and she must not leave Cuba.

There are some beautiful moments that depict the rage of the people against the brutality of Castro's regime. One of those is the attack on the Hotel Deauville in Havana. Most of the buildings in Castro's time are plain, dull, and suffer from sameness. The  Deauville stands as a symbol of the artifice and falseness of Castro's reign trying to put on a friendly face to the world, particularly the United States, while the people are starving and terrified.

 It comes as no surprise that someone shatters the windows of the Deauville resulting in praise from Insurrectionists, like Clara. Afterwards, 32 emigres are murdered right off the Cuban coast perhaps in retaliation for the protest at the Deauville. This passage shows the dangers inherent in both leaving and staying in a violent regime and reflects the courage those have to stand against it: those who brave certain death to leave or imprisonment and violence if they stay.

Besides opening a violent period in Cuban history, Gonzalez cleverly rewrites the story of Jesus'conception. A chapter pulls the Reader from the modern realistic story of a couple leaving Castro's oppression to a strangely supernatural satire. This involves an extended conversation between God and his First Born. Jesus is written as a somewhat entitled brat who has only child syndrome,but still suffers the pain of his sacrifice and wonders what his father is planning. 

God seems distant like a chess player who is only playing against himself. He claims that he is fathering another child simply to enjoy being a parent, since he was so distant with Jesus' upbringing, but Jesus suspects ulterior motives. Otherwise why would he want Clara and her future daughter, Luz (meaning "Light") to remain in such a dangerous country like Cuba?

Clara is also a very strong willed feisty character. She stands alongside the Insurrectionists against Castro. She is willing to fight against everyone, even members of her own family, to leave Cuba. When Gabriel delivers the Good News to her, she is much more argumentative than Mary. At first, she is confused being a lukewarm Catholic who is more agnostic about the possibility of an angel being next to her in the first place. Then she lists several reasons why she could not possibly be a mother, let alone God's first (or rather second after Mary) choice. Gabriel's answer why not her and why not in Cuba are not enough.

What turns Clara around is not Gabriel's pronouncement, but her own anger at what the Castro regime is doing. She believes that she could fight better from the inside and also raise Luz to be a light against the fear. That light gives her the confidence to face what she knows will be dark days ahead.

Luz is a very moving, beautiful, and spiritual novel which will make the Reader laugh at the strangeness but also stand alongside people like Clara who fight against tyranny even if, especially when, they have to do it from the inside.