El mundo de afuera

The Outside World takes place in Medellín. There, time is wrapped in a mist, and voices seem like whistles that get lost among tree branches. A castle-like structure stands watch in the overgrown outskirts of the city, and a blond girl runs out the door. Eyes watch, captivated by this unusual presence, and the girl disappears into the forest. It is 1971, and this girl's father, don Diego, has been kidnapped. El Mono is the leader of the crime ring, whose intention is to demand a million-dollar ransom from the family. El Mono has reasons aside from economics to kidnap don Diego: a romantic obsession with the man's daughter, Isolda, a blonde princess whose father, a devotee of Wagner's operas, has kept her locked in the "castle" to preserve her purity and avoid sullying her with the crude outside world that surrounds them. Don Diego, a Germanophile, is married to Dita, a German woman who left Nazi Berlin to live in the replica of La Rouchefoucauld castle that her husband has built in Medellín. Since she was little, Isolda has escaped into the woods, where she played with imaginary rabbits, while El Mono would watch her, hidden in the trees. Short and uncomplicated, this novel about love and death is both poetic and vivid, with a masterful use of tension, incorporation of cinematographic techniques such as flashback and parallel narration, and the echoes of both folkloric tales and news blotters.

"Isolda vive encerrada en un castillo extraño y fascinante al mismo tiempo, tan ajeno a la ciudad de Medellín en la que se sitúa como singulares son sus habitantes y la vida que llevan. La atmósfera de irrealidad que se respira resulta opresiva para la adolescente, que encuentra en el bosque que lo rodea la única tregua posible a su soledad. Pero las amenazas invisibles del mundo de afuera se cuelan silenciosamente entre las ramas de los árboles cercanos al castillo. Con un perfecto manejo de la tensión, Jorge Franco construye en esta novela un cuento de hadas con tintes tenebrosos que acaba convirtiéndose en la historia desquiciada de un secuestro. Dentro y fuera de la fortaleza, el amor, ese monstruo indomable, se muestra como una obsesión que aliena y embrutece, que pretende someter, que despierta deseos de venganza y del que solo parece posible escapar aceptando la muerte como destino."--P. [4] of cover.