Está bien

I had listened to Hector during a panel at Singapore Writers' Festival last week and was so moved (& so impressed by the chapter he read) that I immediately bought the book after the reading (& was lucky enough to have it signed!).

I read it steadily throughout the week during my commutes and today I completed it sitting below my block. When the sadder chapters arrived I found myself tearing up in trains and finally when I got to the final 20 pages I found myself with a pained throat and watery eyes from holding back tears. I cannot imagine what it must have been like for him to have written such a book, to recount such a memory. That it took 20 years for him to finally pen it down is something that is understandable. I cannot imagine what it must have taken to write it down, but I am thankful that he shared the story of his father & his family to the world.

During the panel someone asked about challenges & aside from the obvious he said that the literary tradition was replete with stories about bad fathers. Daddy issues. And how would people take his book that is about a good father, a perfect father, a father that he loved so much and in his eyes could barely do any wrong. And in fact I find that his book was such a wonderful read precisely because it provides a model for fatherhood that isn't made toxic by a certain brand of masculinity. He did mention that his father had a certain kind of machismo, but it was wonderful to read how his father was unashamed of his exuberant physical affections with his son, kissing & hugging him even if it was seen as 'queer' by relatives. Saying a string of verbal affections that one might find embarrassing. In a society where the expression of direct affection by men is not encouraged, it's wonderful to read an example where the opposite is done.

His father truly sounds like an incredible human being, a person whose moral & humanist values are worth emulating. I truly enjoyed the bits where Hector talked about the way his father dealt with the challenges and the confusions of his son; his open-mindedness, his unconditional love. I have learned so much for my own personal & political convictions. The book deals mostly with celebrating the love, social justice work, ideas, & charity that his father was involved in, and only the last few chapters actually dealt with his murder. Hector wrote it as a way of stretching out the memory of his father a little bit more, before it is inevitably casted into the oblivion of forgetting, the way we forget about so many people. I'm sure that will happen, but I am so glad that I have known of his father in my own little way too. ( )

De mis libros favoritos, es un libro que maneja un estilo tan personal y un vocabulario que te hace sentir parte del libro. Hace una crítica a la historia Colombiana desde una postura melencólica, romántica y con un profundo amor hacia el amor paterno que lo hace mágico a la hora de leer. Es de los libros que nunca se olvidan ( )

libro mal redactado , pero muy emocional ( )

Es un muy buen libro ya que se cuenta la vida del autor de una manera muy detallada, permitiendonos sentir las emociones de diversos hechos que vivio el autor, tracsendido por aspectos como la influencia de su padre y la violencia en Colombia. ( )