This book was a short read, I think it touches on the topic of identity and illusions. The story follows the friendship of Felix and his surprising houseguest Eulálio. I envy Felix because I have actually dreamt about this specific scenario, talking to my animal sidekick is insane and I need this to happen to me. The author blurs the line between fiction and reality in this book and gives the readers a place where our pasts are not fixed and our identities can be fluid.

Felix is a man who does extensive research for his job and creates fabricated past and new identities for his clients. I feel like he is so controlled within his life that when Eulálio comes in, he disrupts Felix’s solitude. Eulálio has such a complex past I think Felix does not know how exactly to approach the situation, but soon they become good friends. The act of Felix changing and burying pasts makes the readers think about how much we don’t know about others and makes us question reality.

Like many of the books we read, this book has a heavy focus on memory. Eulálio, in particular, emerges as a symbol of the fluidity of identity, almost embodying the chameleon-like nature of human existence. As Felix struggles finding himself, he is forced to confront the possibility that his carefully constructed reality may be nothing more than an illusion. I think he starts to realize that he can create any version of himself he wants, but when is that supposed to end? When is he really going to figure out who he is and what his life has been. It makes me question how easy I can manipulate my memories and how easy it is to forget oneself when living in an illusion for so long.

Honestly at some points of the novel I though Ventura and Buchmann were the same person. There were overlaps at some points that lead me to think that because of the way they would see the same events but in different perspectives, was that just Felix trying to see it in a different way? This book was set after a bloody war so Felix could have split personalties due to trauma or tragic experiences he witnessed that caused his enough stress to want to disassociate somehow. Eulálio was the catalyst to Felix’s road to self discovery and a symbol that memories are malleable but you have to be careful because sometimes you can get stuck in the worst ones and they may become real. Eulálio’s death by scorpion was a perfect example of that.

Question of the week, did you also think buchmann and Ventura were the same person or did you interpret this differently ?