A vast family novel about immigration, inheritance and belonging.

Nélida Piñon begins with the death of Eulália, matriarch of the Madruga family, then moves backwards and sideways through nearly a century of memory. From Galicia to Brazil, from poverty to wealth, from the intimacy of family mythology to the larger inventions of nation and class. At its centre is Madruga, a Galician immigrant whose rise in Rio de Janeiro produces both a dynasty and a private empire of resentment, loyalty, ambition and debt.

First published in Portuguese as A República dos Sonhos in 1984, the novel was translated into English by Helen Lane. It is enormous, digressive and properly novelistic: immigration saga, family chronicle and meditation on the imaginative machinery by which people turn experience into lineage.

Picador, London, 1994. First UK edition. Paperback. Light rubbing and shelf wear to covers and edges, with minor creasing and corner wear visible. Pages lightly age-toned but clean; binding firm. Very good condition.