The Time of the Hero
A Novel
ISBN10: 0374520216
ISBN13: 9780374520212
Trade Paperback
412 Pages
$20.00
CA$26.99
The action of The Time of the Hero, Nobel Prize-winning author Mario Vargas Llosa's first novel, takes place at the Leoncio Prado Military Academy in Lima, Peru. There, four angry cadets who have formed an inner circle in an attempt to ward off the boredom and stifling confinement of the military academy set off a chain of events that starts with a theft and leads to murder and suicide. The Time of the Hero presents, with great accuracy and power, the cadets' nightmare life: brutal initiation rights, poker in the latrines, drinking contests; and, above all else, the strange military code which, whether broken or followed, can only destroy.
When The Time of the Hero was first published in Peru in 1962, it was considered so scandalous that a thousand copies were burned in an official ceremony at the Leoncio Prado Military Academy. That same year, the book received the Biblioteca Breve Prize, an award given to the best work of fiction in the Spanish language.
BOOK EXCERPTS
Read an Excerpt
TIME OF THE HERO (Chapter 1)
"Four," the Jaguar said.
Their faces relaxed in the uncertain glow which the light bulb cast through the few clean pieces of glass. There was no danger for anyone now except Porfirio Cava. The dice had stopped...
About the author
Mario Vargas Llosa; Translated by Lysander Kemp
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