Book Review: Telenovela

Today, we have reviewed, "Telenovela" by Victor Cass.

Life can be one big soap opera when culture clashes with romance and infidelity

When legal secretary Lorena Sandoval chooses to be single and celibate while waiting for the right man, she bumps into Miriya, a determined girl on the go, whose womanizing hunk of a boyfriend, Arturo, is cheating on her. Lorena learns of this affair while she and Miriya became fast friends. What Lorena doesn't know is that Miriya has been having a secret fling of her own with a mysterious lover. Lorena later thinks she's met the right man in art store manager Steven Meztaz. But the real trouble begins when she introduces Steven to Miriya! It's girl's night out, friendship drama, and sexy romps in the land of the telenovela!

Reviewed by: Bela M.

Rating:

Review: You can't get anymore Latina than a telenovela, right? This book, like a telenovela, is divided into different parts. Part I tells the background of Miriya from adjusting to U.S. life and trying to lose her accent as a child to losing her father as a grown woman. In Part II, we learn about Lorena's family history and origins starting with her grandmother's marriage and conception of her children. All the suspicion, lies, and infidelity doesn't begin until Lorena notices Miriya in a local coffee shop one day. The scenes are just as sizzly and steamy in this book as they are on a TV screen. And while this story takes place, a real telenovela that every character in the book just can't live without it seems, is being watched somewhere in the background. It's a soap opera within a soap opera.

The beautiful descriptions and vivid details helped bring the story to life. The hilarious dialogue brought me back to the days when all the women in my family craved the "soap opera" life through tons and tons of juicy gossip. It has all the drama of a telenovela--sadness, jealousy, suspicion, and betrayal. At times, it was a tad predictable, and some of the sex scenes were a little too graphic for my taste (I guess that's why I don't read erotica novels.) I also thought there were too many characters. C'mon, I really didn't need to know everyone's life story. Also, there was too much cussing. I understand that cussing is a part of the everyday language. I don't have virgin ears, ya know? And, let's face it, sometimes you do need a little cussing in a novel. But there is such a thing as too much cussing. I'd say I ran into f#!* and sh#! about 20-30 times in one page. The author used these words so much that they practically lost their meaning. Enough already, I get it!

All in all, I get what the author was trying to do in this book, and I commend him for that. The story is easy to get through and leaves you content, even though I wasn't too happy with Lorena's ending. That was kind've a bummer.