Breaking Lorca

by BLUNT, GILES

• ISBN13: 9780307357014
• ISBN10: 0307357015
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-02-23
• Publisher: Vintage Canada

Summary

A master crime writer trains every weapon in his arsenal on a crime against humanity. A literary novel that treads fearlessly into one of recent history's most shocking moral crucibles. In 1980s El Salvador, a young woman is detained in a government torture squad's head-quarters, suspected of supporting guerilla forces. There, a bookish new recruit, Victor Pena, is assigned to assist in her interrogation. Before they learn so much as her name Lorca the squad relentlessly break her, body and soul. It is a terrifying journey into human cruelty and courage, one which years later in the pinnacle of cosmopolitan America still haunts the tormentor as dramatically as it does his victim.

Author Biography

Giles Blunt grew up in North Bay, Ontario. After spending over twenty years in New York City, he now lives in Toronto. He is the author of four crime novels set in the fictional city of Algonquin Bay and featuring John Cardinal as well as No Such Creature, which Random House Canada will publish in fall 2008. He lives in Toronto.


From the Hardcover edition.

Excerpts

Chapter One

Sooner or later the other soldiers in the squad were going to kill him. It was only a matter of time. Victor had never done anything to antagonize the brutes he worked with, but he was sure they hated him, or soon would.

He had wanted such a different life. He had wanted to be a teacher, but war had come and schools were closed. Many teachers were killed, many disappeared. Both of Victor’s parents were dead; he had joined the army out of necessity. Now all he wanted was to stay alive.

He tried to concentrate on the paperback in his hand. Victor was readingOf Mice and Men– very slowly, and with an English—Spanish dictionary – but even reading at this turtle’s pace, he was touched by the loyalty between the two men: big, dumb Lenny and shrewd, crabby George. John Steinbeck knew that people should exist in pairs. Victor would have given anything for a friend, someone to be loyal to, but there was no one like that in this place.

A friend might have helped stem the tide of fear that rose around him; he could feel it lapping at his chin. Soon the waters would close over his mouth and nose and he would drown altogether. The Captain hated him to be reading, he knew that, but there was simply no other way, lacking a friend, that he could distract himself from the fear that – maybe not for a month, maybe not for two – the other soldiers were going to kill him.

In America, now, things would be different. They had jobs in America, not war. You didn’t have to carry a rifle to prove your manhood. He could go to a vast American city and lose himself among the crowds. No one would know what a coward he was. He would work at two jobs, three if necessary, and perhaps one day open a restaurant or a store. Maybe New York, maybe Washington, he hadn’t decided yet. That was the nice thing about a fantasy, there were no decisions to make. He devoted himself to the study of English, knowing that one day he would speak it in America. Oh, all of the soldiers spoke a little English, but none of them could read it – he wasn’t even sure if his uncle could read it.

Not that he could lose himself for long in fantasy, not at the little school. The air was sour with the smell of bodily fluids. The guardroom was a tiny space between the cells and the interrogation room. Pretty much the only thing the soldier on guard had to do was to bring the latrine bucket to the cells as needed, and to shoot anyone who tried to escape. There was no chance of that. Guard duty was easy, but the stench from the cells was not something you could forget for more than a few minutes at a time.

“Reading again.” The Captain filled the entire doorway, casting a shadow over the book.

“Yes. Same story,” Victor said, showing the cover. Anger emanated from his uncle like heat from a stove.

Captain Peña did not even glance at the book. “That’s why you took guard duty, I suppose. Even though it’s not your turn.”

“The others enjoy their card games. I thought, why not let them?”

“You don’t do it for them. You do it because you want to read.”

“Well, yes,” he said with what he hoped was a disarming smile. “Reading is definitely my vice.”

“Don’t imagine you’re making friends by taking extra duty. You read in here because you don’t want to be with them. You think they don’t know that?”

“They like cards, I like books. Why is that a problem?”

“Don’t be stupid. They know you are from a different class. By reading, you rub their noses in it.”

“I don’t think I’m better than them.”

“Then you’re even stupider than I thought. With your background and education? Of course you are better than them. Bu

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Excerpted from Breaking Lorca by Giles Blunt
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