Inés of My Soul

With Inés of My Soul, Isabel Allende reaches far back in Chilean history to tell the fictionalized story of a woman forgotten to history. In the 16th century, Inés Suarez was a poor seamstress in Spain whose husband went to the Americas to seek his fortune. After he disappears, she gets royal permission to search for him and sails to the New World to discover he had been killed in Peru. She settles in Cuzco and falls passionately in love with the conquistador Pedro de Valdivia. His dream is to conquer Chile, an area with fierce indigenous tribes who have held off others who have attempted to colonize them. With Ines and her sword at his side, Valdivia leads his conquistadors south from Peru, carving out a new country in the process. Inés of My Soul has received mostly positive reviews with the Miami Herald saying, “The historic battles are well-told, as seen through Inés’ perspective, but it is in the matching of a historical timeline with the intimacy of the conquistadors’ lives that Allende spins a fabulous tale.”