This book is really interesting to me for a multitude of reasons. As a boy from the prairies of Alberta I couldn’t be farther from the turbulent and yet vibrant dives and campuses of Mexico city. Yet through the life of Auxilio I feel connected to both the joy and spontaneity that living on the margins of society brings, yet also the realities stark realities of poverty that comes from non conformity. There is a frankness in the writing that really allows you to connect with the narrative that I haven’t seen in any of the books we’ve read so far. Whether that be frankness about her perceived promiscuity or the realities of being an unhoused and semi employed person. This is especially poignant to me in the scene with the King, Arturo, and Ernesto. Although everything works out for the characters through this interaction with the pimp king it is only because of the horrors and violence that Arturo has faced in Chile. In combination with this very realistic sense of atmosphere Bolaño also has a very fluid concept of time throughout the novel. This fluidity is centered around the September 1968 student movements across Mexico. Specifically at the UNAM campus as all the students and faculty were arrested. Auxilio in an act of resistance hides from the police and spends many days in the washroom alone. Throughout the narrative we are brought back to this scene as she experience events simultaneously. As an aside this view of time and overall ethereal quality really remind me of Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse 5. Although a work of science fiction and with very different messaging, the way both authors play with and twist are concepts of time are both intriguing and confusing at the same time. The hallucinatory vision of the dead writer Remedios Varo is of special interest as she doesnt jump back to the bathroom on the 4th floor but rather is there the whole time as she experiences this meeting. I think that the 4th floor bathroom of the philosophy and literature faculty is the height of this romantic and often sidelined character, both good and bad. It epitomizes the revolutionary and rebellious sentiment that permeates a person living on the margins. Yet we are also shown that this was a traumatic experience that has shaped the rest of her life. I’m not sure what to make of the ending honestly, the blending of reality and story reaches a height as she finally leaves the bathroom destitute but right.