Revelations of Latin Women Breathe Life Into ‘Sunday Tertulia’

One of the benefits of the popularity of Latin culture is the increase in the number of Latin-themed books being published. Added to the list of recent titles by Isabel Allende and Julia Alvarez is newcomer Lori Marie Carlson. Her first novel, “The Sunday Tertulia,” attempts to mine the rich storytelling vein being worked by Allende, Alvarez and others, while exposing the reader to a little-known Latin social tradition and the diversity of Latin women’s experiences.

Carlson’s heroine is Claire, a young Anglo-American who has moved to New York and taken a job as a translator. She encounters an older group of women--Isabela, a retired Cuban-born Puerto Rican pharmacist; Aroma, a Mexican gynecologist; Luna, a Peruvian chef; and Sonia, an Argentine professor--who quickly invade her life and invite her to their Sunday tertulia, a salon of sorts accompanied by good food and much conversation. Imagine Amy Tan’s “The Joy Luck Club” crossed with Laura Esquivel’s “Like Water for Chocolate.”

It is through the tertulia that the women reveal themselves--their opinions and advice, secrets and recipes. Claire sits among them, an observer and listener but seldom a participant in the passionate exchanges. Unsure of herself among these wiser Latinas, Claire is reduced to reflective summations at the end of the chapters and a few lines at the beginning of each that set up the action and advance the slender plot: “Discussing problems at a tertulia is different . . . [than] a te^te-a-te^te over coffee. What I truly appreciate . . . is the intense activity of thought and the love of words. . . . Our meeting has to do with narrative in all its forms.”

Indeed, author Carlson’s love and appreciation for Latin cadences and culture comes through on every page of “The Sunday Tertulia.” As the women hold forth in their monologues--Aroma discussing health lore and use of vegetables and herbs to enhance beauty or Luna affirming deep spirituality--the reader begins to sense the richness and variety of the cultures represented. Poetry by Shakespeare, Pablo Neruda and Marjorie Agostin is spontaneously recited as easily as recipes exchanged for Sunday chicken or horchatas, healthful fruit shakes. Stories are woven in between, of triumph over adversity, of love and luck, both good and bad.

Yet for all its enchantments, “The Sunday Tertulia” eventually sags from the accumulated weight of the interchangeable tales and advice given to Claire and the lack of a clear or compelling story line. Moreover, although a good listener and commentator, the young protagonist doesn’t seem to have much of a life outside the tertulia: Her oppressive job situation and dating life seem pallid afterthoughts in the narrative, and though the reader is told how much the sessions affect her, we don’t get to see her growth or development. In fact, because of a surprising revelation made by Luna midway through the book, Claire becomes even less of a character and more of a voice-over as the women struggle to advise their friend. Unfortunately, it is one of the few moments where the book rises from being a fictionalized oral history to becoming an engaging novel.

“The Sunday Tertulia” is heartfelt, intelligent and reflects author Carlson’s wealth of knowledge as a bilingual English-Spanish writer, translator and editor. But too often her knowledge and passion get in the way of just telling a good story. One hopes, though, that as she continues to write, she learns from women like Tan, Allende and Alvarez, who make the history and sociology secondary to the compelling narratives they weave.