Los Divinos
From acclaimed Colombian author Laura Restrepo comes a powerhouse of a novel inspired by a true crime that shattered a community and exposed the dark recesses of toxic masculinity and privilege.
The body of a young girl is found floating in water in what seems to be a profane ritual, an intent to recreate the death scene of Shakespeare’s Ophelia. Whoever celebrated it, has tried to honor and compensate the vic-tim by washing away the obscure and evidently cruel circumstances of her death ¿Or was he really washing away evidence to cover up for the assassin?
With a profound, personal writing style, Laura Restrepo unveils the dark background lurking behind this episode, and reveals the ostentatious, flashy world of five young men, rich and successful professionals, bound together since childhood in a mischievous brotherhood they call the Tutti Frutti.
Immune to the consequences of immorality, five privileged young men in Bogotá bond over a shared code: worship drugs and drink, exploit women, and scorn the underclass.
As males, they declare the right to freedom of pleasure. As friends, only disloyalty to each other is forbidden. When a little girl from the slums disappears, the limits of a perverse and sacred bond will be tested in ways none of them could have imagined.
On the absolute opposite end of the young men's universe, their victim, an adolescent girl, lives on the outskirts of the city among her people, emigrants who have fled from the war and violence consuming their former rural enviroment.
Fictional reinvention of a true crime, The Divine Boys unfolds as a moving but disturbing indictment of femicide and a haunting new novel from one of Latin America's best loved authors.
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“Restrepo triumphs in her depiction of toxic masculinity and the clash of social classes, and navigates her characters through a sensational crime without subscribing to stereotypes. This elegy for lost youth and innocence is a powerhouse.” —Publishers Weekly
“A compelling story of how men who revel in misogyny and privilege can create a brutal darkness.” —Kirkus Reviews
A compelling story of toxic masculinity, entitlement born of privilege, and lost innocence." –The Guardian
"Ms. Restrepo, through this deft translation by Carolina De Robertis, has written an account of murder, guilt, and culpability that’s both lyrical and heart- wrenching." –CriminalElement.com