The Blog Has A New Home

Our blog has a new home. Same great content just a new address (http://blog.isabelallende.com). You'll be redirected to it so please update your bookmarks and while you are at it check out the new web site.

Poetry For The Weary

As you can imagine, Isabel gets a lot of fan mail. Her assistant sifts through everything here at the office, sorting the mail into three piles that Isabel can go through at her convenience. In general, mail falls into three categories: the stunning, the ordinary, and the scary or obscene. More often than not, fan mail falls into the “stunning” category. For example, Isabel recently received a letter that we just have to share with blog readers. It came in the form of verse from a Brazilian fan named Lázaro Piunti. Here it is, first in Portuguese, then in English:

ISABEL ALLENDE!

Quando o cansaço espiritual se revelar acentuado, ante as armadilhas perpetradas pelos iníquos e pelos que não amam,
Recorde-se de Isabel Allende!

Quando os desafios se mostrarem imbatíveis, alimentados pelo egoísmo dos ambiciosos,
Busque vigor e esperança no exemplo de
Isabel Allende!

Nas ocasiões em que o desânimo - nutrido pelos dominadores que não se contentam com pouco - ameaçar sua liberdade,
Refugie-se na coerência e na coragem de
Isabel Allende!

Eis aí uma alma latina, cidadã do mundo, sinal de vida nova, lampejo incandescente, que se revigora a cada passo e momento, devolvendo a Fé no gênero humano.

Sua vida é um poema, suas mensagens crônicas eternais, sua caminhada bálsamo e luz!

Isabel Allende – bênção das galáxias par um mundo contraditório e hostil!


 Lázaro Piunti
(poeta – escritor – cronista)



Translation:

When spiritual weariness reveals its sharp accents,
set against the traps and snares of the wicked
and those who do not love,
Remember Isabel Allende!

When men of bravado prove unbeatable,
nurtured by their egoism and ambition,
look for energy and hope in the example of
Isabel Allende!

At times when one loses hope and discouragement is nurtured by dictators
not content with but a little, and threaten our liberty,
Take refuge in the coherency and courage of the example of
Isabel Allende

Here is a Latin Soul, a citizen of the world, the single sign of a new life,
an incandescent flash that gives us back our strength at each step
and moment of the way
returning our faith in human kind,

Her life is a poem, her messages chronicles of eternity,
whose passage through our lives brings healing and light!
Isabel Allende — A blessing of the galaxies for a hostile and contradictory world!

(Translated by Thomas Hunter)

Isabel's New Website Goes Live

This week, in addition to being named one of the ten most powerful women authors by Forbes, Isabel has a new website.


Here it is! After ten months of fiddling, the new and improved Isabel Allende website is up this week. Check it out and let us know what you think.

My favorite part of the new site? The different international covers for each book. You might notice that European covers tend to show more skin…

Maya's Notebook

The new book is out! Well, so far it’s only out in Spanish; look for it in English next year. To celebrate the launch of Maya’s Notebook (El cuaderno de Maya), Isabel is jetting off to Spain, where she will present the novel at the Madrid Book Fair from June 7 to 12. Later this summer, she and Maya’s Notebook will make their way down to South America. More about that coming soon.

Beading Times

I recently visited Isabel at home. It was a beautiful sunny day but I wasn’t there to sit and chat in the garden. I was interested in seeing what she’s been up to with her favorite hobby.

Because she is not writing a book this year, Isabel has been filling her days with do-gooder causes and such time-killing activities as...beading. Yes, beading. Trust me, the woman makes a mean necklace! Among other talents too numerous to recount just now, but of which I shall endeavor to write about in the future, Isabel creates really lovely jewelry. Her jewelry isn’t for sale, though. Isabel gives her necklaces to her friends and family, as well as to various charitable organizations to be sold as auction items (which by the way are ALL spoken for so don’t bother to ask).


Here she is amongst some of her creations. 

This Friday!

Catch Isabel this Friday, May 20th 12 – 2pm at Book Passage in Corte Madera, Calif.,  where she’ll be at a Literary Luncheon and book reading celebrating the paperback release of Island Beneath the Sea.  The ticket price of $55 includes lunch and a signed book.
Call (415) 927-0960 ext. 1 to reserve a seat.
Book Passage • Corte Madera Store
51 Tamal Vista Blvd
Corte Madera, California  94925

Can't attend the event? Order a signed copy!
Please note: lunch is catered by Insalata’s Restaurant. Seriously tasty food!


You can also find Isabel on May 25th 7 – 9pm at the Rafael Theater, in San Rafael, Calif., for an on-stage conversation and introduction of  Nostalgia for the Light, a Chilean documentary by Patricio Guzmán.
Find out more by clicking here.  You can see trailers for the  Nostalgia for the Light and take a look at the film’s official website by clicking here. Isabel will introduce and discuss a special screening of filmmaker Patricio Guzmán's poetic documentary about Chile's Atacama Desert and its significance for astronomy, archaeology and historical memory. Located more than 10,000 feet above sea level, the Atacama Desert is one of the driest places on earth, its thin atmosphere and negligible humidity making it a magnet for astronomers, an ideal location for observatories and an important archive of pre-Columbian civilization. But it was also the site of a concentration camp created in the 1970s by the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, and today not only scientists wander there, but also mothers and relatives looking for the remains of political prisoners who "disappeared." Veteran Chilean filmmaker Patricio Guzmán has dedicated much of his career to the remembrance of events following the military coup of September 11, 1973, and this personal and beautiful film essay has, in the words of The New York Times, "a moral as well as a metaphysical weight." In Spanish with English subtitles. Writer/Narrator/Director: Patricio Guzmán. (Chile 2010) 90 min. plus discussion.

Thorsten….

After returning home following a little gathering at Isabel’s over the weekend, I was plagued by one nagging question: Who the hell was that German guy at the party? And why was he so protective of the Isabel???

When I inquired the next day, here is what Isabel had to say:

Dear Sarah,


In 2006 I had the honor of being one of the eight women who carried the Olympic flag at the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy.  Unfortunately I was right behind Sofia Loren and in front of Susan Sarandon, so nobody noticed me. Also, in most of the pictures I am under the flag; you can only see my feet. Anyway…getting back to your question. For the event I had a German bodyguard, Thorsten Deckert: 6.7 feet of pure muscle, crew-cut hair, black leather, weapons. He looked very threatening but soon I discovered that he had the soft heart of a maiden and we became friends. He has come to visit us in the Bay Area a couple of times, traveling all the way from the Black Forest region of southwestern Germany.  This time he brought me the most unusual present: one of his police uniforms. It's not exactly my size but I will definitely wear it. In the picture I’m sending you, Thorsten is on the right.

Isabel and Thorsten the German Guy at the party! In case you can't tell, Isabel is on the left....thanks for clarifying that Isabel.

Isabel and Sophia Loren at the 2006 Winter Olympics.