Disappointing

I bought this book never having read anything else by Isabel Allende, but I had high expectations given the generally positive feedback from my friends about her other books. I am a huge fan of historical fiction, and I have to say that this book has been a major letdown for me compared to the quality of the novels of Bernard Cornwell, Eiji Yoshikawa, Larry McMurty, and other greats. Allende's style annoyed me greatly because she seems to enjoy writing long descriptive passages with only brief snatches of simplistic dialogue that does nothing to enchant the reader. There is no period immersion; I never got the impression of being in 19th century America/Spain. Spain and America seem to be pretty interchangable, with the characters having no trouble adapting to new exotic locales. I never could garner any sympathy for the protagonist Diego, or any of the other two-dimensional characters for that matter, because they fit into easily-defined stereotypes: Diego - dashing, handsome hero; Bernardo - wise Native American who doesn't take risks; Juliana - beautiful but ditzy blonde; Isabel - ugly duckling of the family who makes up for her lack of beauty by being brave and clever. One can immediately understand all of the characters and their motivations with a one sentence description of each. The one villain who had potential, Monconde (forgive the spelling, read the book a while ago), does hardly anything for most of the book. The scene at the pirate's island seemed to be totally unneccesary except as a device to get rid of Juliana. Once I found out who the narrator was...I didn't care. The narrator's occasional interjections try to be clever in an offhand way but they just come off as cliched. I had high hopes for an interesting read after noticing the blurb hinting at Diego's schizophrenic personality, and was expecting some psychological development in the protagonist struggling not to let the Zorro personality take over. I was wrong. If you absolutely must read a new novel of Zorro, at least wait for the paperback edition.

Spellbinding Retelling of Zorro's origins from Allende

Isabel Allende's romantic prose has never been better and is the ideal means of telling a riveting tale of the origins of Zorro, the enigmatic fictitious Robin Hood of Spanish and Mexican Alta California, in her new novel "Zorro". She tells a splendid swashbuckling tale which tells of Zorro's origins, as Diego de la Vega, the handsome son of a Spanish military officer turned Californian landowner and a Shosone American Indian warrior defeated by her husband in battle. And this is truly a tale of epic proportions, as we see young Diego acquire his sword fighting skills and manhood in French-occupied Barcelona, Spain during the Napoleonic wars. There he will fall in love and become friends with the daughters of Tomas de Romeu, a Francophile merchant, whose wealth and life are soon both lost when the exiled Bourbon monarch, Ferdinand VII, returns to power after the French withdraw from Spain. And he will become the finest swordsman of his time, studying under Maestro Manuel Escalante, and then through his swordfighting teacher, joining La Justica, the secret society devoted to help victims of religious and political persecution, as well as those too impoverished to help themselves from thieves and corrupt government officials. Allende tells of swashbuckling sword fights aboard merchant ships and French military forts waged by the young Diego, before moving on to a final fateful confrontation at his parents' Californian home. I am not surprised that this fine novel has become an instant bestseller (For the record, I thank Harper Collins for sending me an advance reader's edition copy for review.); one of the most highly sought after books for this summer.

Thoroughly Zorro

After reading Isael Allende's novel about Zorro I couldn't be more impressed. In a excellently written narrative Isabel expertly blends all different aspects of Zorro information that she has researched and crafted it into a brilliant novel. This book just cries out to be made into a movie - 'Zorro: The Beginning'. Overall once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down. Let's hope that Isabel will write the continuing story to this brilliant novel about the fox - ZORRO.