En Medellín, una de las ciudades más violentas de la tierra, un Ángel Exterminador recorre las calles 'limpiándolas' de una buena parte de sus habitantes, y librando, de paso, al narrador de lo que parece molestarlo más: el prójimo. Alexis, el ángel, es un chiquillo de las barriadas, un 'sicario' o asesino a sueldo, sin padre y sin ley. Poseído por el misticismo de la destrucción, su vida avanza sobre charcos de sangre. Y en tanto las iglesias, mudos testimonios de una religiosidad antigua, se vacían de fieles, la morgue se llena de cadáveres.
Fernando Vallejo es escritor, cineasta y biólogo colombiano nacido en Medellín y radicado en México, donde ha filmado tres películas y escrito la totalidad de sus libros. ( )

A very sad, sad story about a horrible situation but the way it was told with the first person narrative of the old grammarian made the violence less so and easier to accept. It did not inspire any desire to visit Columbia because that would be scary if this book has any bearing on truth and this book is not couched in any magical realism.

"And three of the onlookers in the crowd sticking up for him. They were the kind of champions of 'human rights', or delinquents' rights, who spring up spontaneously around here and lay claim to that 'defender of the people' role instituted by the new Constitution convoked by the idiot queer."

"The policeman, on of those ultra-young rookies they're recruiting these days to cast into the lions' den unarmed and with their hands tied by the whoremongering of the law, didn't know what to say or what to do."

"...protected by the cowardly boldness of the mob, were apparently ready to apparently let themselves be killed, if it were apparently necessary, by a man who carried no weapons."

It was interesting to learn that the narrator's name is the same as the authors "Fernando". The narrator was gone and is now returned. In his diatribe we are introduced to such topics as Columbia's president, the drug culture, priests, communists, sociologists, television, and soccer". It is a picture of social collapse, a "city where death rules supreme but where nobody will ever die of boredom." ( )

See my blog post on it:

http://gypsylibrarian.blogspot.com/2005/11/booknote-la-virgen-de-los-sicarios.ht... ( )

Massive machine gum misanthropy levels this flaming response to life in Bogota. I read this on the flight from London to DC. The author emitted a great deal of bile. The film, shot on video, was much more effective in framing the monologue. ( )

long suffering diatribe over the political woes of Colombia, especially Medellin. The ugly underbelly of a culture producing amorality. ( )