Violeta

Violeta only tells Etelvina, Josephine, and Juan Martin about Torito’s fate. However, when she mentions her visit to Nahuel, Julián brings up the cave of bodies, and nonchalantly asks if she discovered anything of Torito’s. Violeta realizes that Julián has known about Torito and Juan Martin the entire time. She recalls Nieves’s belief that Julián had Joe Santoro killed, and concludes Julián may have been boarded-up the one to turn Torito in. At the same time, Juan Martin sends Violeta an article about Colonia Esperanza, for which Julián does special flights. The place is rumored to be full of people trapped by a “psychopath” who imposes brutal discipline inside the Colonia, carrying out physical and sexual abuse, even toward children.

Realizing Julián is truly capable of any kind of brutality, Violeta plans to see Julián. She meets Zoraida in Miami, now 40 years old and still harboring hopes that Julián will marry her. Violeta tells Zoraida about Anushka, Julián’s latest secret lover, and the daughter he fathered with her whom he has been financially supporting. Shocked by the betrayal, Zoraida plots and executes her revenge on Julián. With the help of her ex-lover who is a lawyer, Zoraida turns in all the evidence she has on Julián’s illegal businesses, giving the courts enough to prosecute him for fraud, tax evasion, and drug trafficking. Julián hires the best lawyers he can, pays off his fines, and gets his sentence reduced to four years in a minimum-security prison. He comes out healthy and almost as rich as he once was. However, his clout and network are affected following the prison stint, and he gives up his business and moves to a ranch in Patagonia. He asks Violeta to marry and accompany him there, but she turns him down.

Violeta writes about Roy, admitting it is strange to be talking about her lover to her grandson who is a priest; however, Roy was special to her. He treated Violeta with tenderness and respect, and their relationship contained a healthy amount of desire. They would go on vacation a couple of times a year, in which they traveled across the US in Roy’s mobile home.

Violeta’s last trip with Roy is when she is 65, during which she notices he has been losing weight. When they say their goodbyes following the trip, Roy’s eyes uncharacteristically well up, and he asks Violeta to give Camilo his love. Roy is dying of cancer and has hidden his illness from Violeta. Toward the end, Rita calls and tells Violeta the truth, and she immediately flies to Los Angeles, where Roy is hooked up to a respirator in the hospital. He is barely conscious, and Violeta manages to tell him how much she loves him before he dies the next day.

Violeta begins to visit the women she met at the caves in Nahuel along with Facunda, to learn their stories. Facunda has the idea to hold meetings on every other Friday with the women, which Violeta attends once a month. She also begins to learn about women’s organizations that have remained active even within the dictatorship, and gets in touch with these groups, attending meetings until she figures out a way to help. Along the way, Violeta also meets Anton’s young daughter, Mailén, who declares that she is fighting the patriarchal oppression of women. This impresses Violeta, and Mailén comes to play an important role in Violeta’s life later on.

Harald Fiske reenters Violeta’s life in 1986, when he gets posted as the Norwegian ambassador in her country. When he reaches out to Violeta, it has been a year since Roy’s death, and Violeta has given up all thought or expectation of love or romance at her age. Harald slowly becomes a dear friend and companion, each accompanying the other to various events, from work dinners to protest marches. The days of the dictatorship are numbered, at this point, and multiple banned organizations have begun mobilizing in secret.

Violeta takes Harald to one of the Friday meetings and tells him how she wants to do more. After ensuring there is enough money put aside for her, Juan Martin, and Camilo to live by, she puts the rest into a foundation named after Nieves.

Harald eventually asks Violeta to marry him, and she says yes. However, their marriage is delayed when they get news of Camilo’s arrest for spraying anti-government graffiti after having run away from school. Harald contacts the US ambassador, whom he is friendly with, and the ambassador agrees to intervene. Camilo is released two days later, noticeably beaten. He is almost expelled, but Violeta convinces the dean to keep him on.

The world and Violeta’s life change toward the end of the 1980s, with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the Cold War, and the collapse of the dictatorship in Violeta’s country. Secrets of the military regime slowly emerge, among which is Colonia Esperanza. The place is revealed to have been used as a secret prison camp carrying out torture and medical experiments on political prisoners. The director, however, managed to escape unscathed, and lived out the rest of his life in Switzerland.

People associated with the colony are discussed on television, and Fabian’s family is mentioned. Fabian was the liaison between the colony and military security, but apparently didn’t know about the atrocities being carried out. The last Violeta ever heard of Fabian is that he died in 2000, survived by a wife, adopted daughters, and several grandchildren. Julián and his flights never emerge in conversations about the colony.

Juan Martin visits with his wife and daughters to celebrate the country’s political freedom, but quickly feels uncomfortable and out of place, and returns to Norway sooner than planned. He only visits the country a handful of times, and always alone. Violeta and Harald settle in Sacramento after Harald’s retirement, visiting the farm often; she rents out her house in the capital.

After the return of democracy, the Nieves Foundation begins collaborating with numerous women’s groups. The Foundation eventually focuses its efforts on working against domestic violence, because of Etelvina’s younger sister Susana’s experience. Violeta helps rescue Susana from her abusive marriage to a police officer; in the process, she realizes there are not enough laws in place to protect women in such situations. This, combined with her own shameful memories of abuse at Julián’s hands, motivate her to focus the foundation’s work in this area.

After graduating from San Ignacio, Camilo enrolls in a mechanical engineering program at university. He falls in love with an older woman with teenaged kids, prompting Violeta to send him on a summer trip to Norway as a distraction.

While Camilo is away, Violeta runs into Mailén again at a protest, and invites her home for tea. She is impressed that Mailén has retained her activistic fervor from childhood and is now studying psychology at university. Hoping to make a match between Mailén and Camilo, Violeta talks up Camilo to Mailén. Unbeknownst to Violeta, Camilo has begun thinking of entering the seminary.

Despite her age, Violeta’s relationship with Harald keeps her young. The couple takes numerous trips together, including a yearly retreat to a cabin in the woods near Ulefoss, where Harald grew up. Every time, she stops over in Oslo to meet Juan Martin, who has now completely adapted to his adopted country. There is nothing left of the revolutionary he was from his younger days, anymore.

Violeta and Harald visit Camilo in Norway while he is on his summer trip. Harald notices Camilo’s disinterest in the women around him, and his constant preaching about injustice and the sorrows and humanity, and guesses Camilo is leaning toward either Communism or priesthood.

Right enough, Camilo returns home early from Norway with concrete plans to enter the seminar. Violeta rails against this, believing it is a whim, but Harald and Etelvina point out that she cannot intervene in her 22-year-old grandson’s life. Harald leaves for the seminary, leaving a huge void in Violeta and Etelvina’s lives. Facunda dies in 1997 aged 87 and is buried beside the Rivases in the Nahuel cemetery, as per her wishes; the family also loses Crispín the dog that year. Care of Santa Clara passes on to Narcisa, Facunda’s daughter.

During Camilo’s time in the seminary, his primary mode of correspondence with Violeta is through letters. He gets sent to Africa, which Violeta suggests is punishment for Camilo trying to report pedophilia amongst his colleagues. In Congo, however, Camilo is happy, using his hands to solve practical problems—doing carpentry and mechanics, panting vegetables with the locals, and teaching young children. Violeta comes to eventually envy his life, wishing she could be young and start over again, “to share and to serve” (305).

The country elects its first woman president, and Violeta meets with her multiple times, gaining governmental support for the Nieves Foundation, which is working for many of the same aims as the president. Mailén, now 30, she hears about Nieves and reaches out for help with a project providing birth control and sex education. Despite government initiatives in this area, more funds are needed to reach isolated rural areas and Indigenous communities. Violeta and Mailén come up with a plan within 15 minutes, and shortly after, Violeta suggests that Mailén come work with her at the foundation. Mailén soon becomes like a daughter to Violeta.

Violeta enters her nineties still feeling healthy and far from death. However, she is forced to contend with her approaching mortality when Harald, 13 years younger than her, dies on Violeta’s 95th birthday in the middle of the party. Harald’s death leaves Violeta heartbroken.

Violeta recollects how, at age 64, confirmation of Torito’s death set her down a new life path. She carried on her work with vigor for the next three decades of her life, going strong even two years after Harald’s death. At 97, however, she has a fall that leads to surgeries and physical therapy, and eventually the use of a wheelchair. The reduced physical activity frees up enough mind space to begin writing this story and prepare for eventual death.

Violeta moves to Santa Clara with Etelvina to spend her final years. She wants to be buried in the Nahuel cemetery alongside her loved ones, including Nieves, Harald, and Torito. Besides sums kept aside for Etelvina, Juan Martin, and the foundation, the rest of her money will go to Camilo, which she knows will be distributed amongst the poor. Violeta takes solace in her belief that she was able to be a better parent figure to Camilo than she was to her own children.

Violeta now reflects on the “strange symmetry” of having been born in a pandemic, and now dying in one, as coronavirus ravages the world. She is isolated at Santa Clara, with only Camilo and Etelvina for company. Violeta lies in bed waiting for death, as she has for several days now following a sudden hemorrhage. Ghosts of loved ones surround her, Torito the most prominent. Her only sorrow at dying is that she will not be with Camilo anymore; however, she knows that Mailén will comfort Camilo. Violeta believes they will get together eventually, as by Camilo’s confession, a vow of chastity is not the same as celibacy. Violeta wishes her grandson Godspeed as she sees Nieves, come to get her.