My Fathers' Ghost Is Climbing in the Rain
SynopsisPlot
When a young writer returns home to visit his dying father, he finds himself drawn into an obsessive search for a local man gone missing. As the truth—not only about his father but an entire generation—comes to light, the narrator is forced to confront the ghosts of Argentina’s dark political past, as well as long-hidden memories about his own family’s history. Powerful and audacious, this semi-autobiographical novel is a thoroughly original story of corruption and responsibility, of history and remembrance, from one of South America’s most important new writers.
Story
About this book
A young Argentine writer living abroad returns home when his father falls seriously ill. While sorting through papers and notes in the family house, he discovers that his father had been investigating the disappearance of a local man. The narrator begins to follow the same trail, piecing together clues about the missing person and gradually uncovering connections to a much larger and more disturbing history.
The story is set against the background of Argentina's last military dictatorship, which lasted from 1976 to 1983 and left tens of thousands of people dead or forcibly disappeared. As the narrator digs further into his father's research, he finds that his own family was more closely involved in the political struggles of that era than he had understood. The book is semi-autobiographical, drawing on author Patricio Pron's own experience of returning to Argentina and confronting his parents' generation and its silences.
Pron was named one of Granta's Best Young Spanish-Language Novelists. The novel moves between the narrator's present-day search and fragments of the past, exploring how political violence passes through families and how much of a shared history can be kept hidden before it surfaces on its own.
