Money to Burn is the most “movie-like” book we’ve read so far. It’s based on a real 1965 armored truck robbery in Buenos Aires that spins out into weeks of hiding, and finally a siege in Montevideo where the gang literally sets money on fire. The book covers several events: the planning, the robbery itself, and the police closing in. All the while, journalists, witnesses, and cops give their own versions of the events that occured.
The most interesting relationship in the book, for me, was the relationship between Dorda (the Blond Gaucho) and Brignone (the Kid), the “Twins”.
“Dorda is heavy and quiet, with a ruddy face and an easy smile. Brgnone is thin, slightly built, agile, has black hair and a complex so pallid, it looks as if he’s spent more time in jail than he actually has.” (pg. 1)
The two of them move through the story as a pair of homosexual(??) men in a world built on macho performance and violence, and Piglia never lets you forget how out of place that makes them. As Silva and the cops close in, you can see how those circumstances affect their relationship. It holds, in the sense that they don’t betray each other, but it also destroys them. The closer they get to each other, the more their relationship becomes impossible to separate from the violence around it.
The book’s pacing is hectic in the first half: names, nicknames, side characters, and bodies appear and disappear so quickly that it’s kind of hard to keep track (although I might’ve gotten used to it at this point). At first, I found that frustrating, but I think that it was an intentional choice by Piglia, like being transported into the chaos of the city and the investigation itself. I also appreciated that Piglia never turns the gang into antiheroes, as they are anything but innocent. In general, though, the book never really tells you who to side with. The gang is responsible for some awful things: they kill guards, hit civilians, make reckless choices, and there’s no attempt to frame them as tragic, misunderstood guys underneath it all. At the same time, the police don’t feel like the good guys either. Piglia expresses that there is no real inherent ‘good’ or ‘bad’ here, which makes it harder to decide to whom your sympathy is supposed to go. (if anyone at all)
Anyways, as a true-crime fan, I found myself enjoying this book a lot!
Discussion question: Who do you think are the real ‘villains’ of the story? Or is there no one truly at fault here?
5 replies on “Thoughts on Money to Burn”
It could also be that the author of the book wants us to see that the true fault does not lie with the characters themselves, but somewhere else, more perverse and hidden in plain sight!
Remember to use categories to indicate the author (Piglia), and tags for key concepts or topics that you cover in your blog post (relationships, chaos, ambivalence?).
I think that the real villains are the robbers. Even though we empathize with them and hope they win, it’s only because we see the story from their side. If we saw them from an outside perspective, such as the people watching the streets, we would see them as murderers, criminals, and selfish for burning the money.
Honestly, I believe the real “villains” depend on which part of the story, and whose perspective we focus on. It’s hard to say there are no villains, but obviously, there are multiple villains within this story, including those appearing from each character’s past. The trauma and harsh environments of the characters do not justify their actions, but it is evident that these factors have impacted them greatly. Hence, the real villains in this story changes upon which part of the story we focus on.
Hi Fiona! To answer your question, I don’t think there’s one clear villain, which is what makes the novel so interesting. The gang obviously causes a lot of harm, but the police, the media, and the whole violent system around them also make everything feel even uglier and more hopeless.