Red April

The story unfolds around presidential elections and Holy Week in the year 2000, which is to say, in a period after the internal confrontations caused by the civil war that took place in Perú in the decades of the eighties and the nineties. Nonetheless, the after-effects of this clash are evident in the novel as is discussed.

The main character, Associate District Prosecutor Félix Chacaltana Saldívar—who as associate district attorney attempts to investigate serial murders supposedly related to resurgent terrorists of Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path), despite lacking direct, first-hand experience with the armed conflict that battered the country—upon whose return to Ayacucho and while in the pursuit of his duties becomes involved with people that definitely have had experience with Senderistas like Edith, the daughter of terrorists; with Hernán Durango (a jailed terrorist) and Commander Carrión.

Associate District Prosecutor Félix Chacaltana Saldívar appears at first as someone who has great faith in the formality of procedures. He is organized, precise and pedantic to a “T”, with high regard for proper grammar—in a word, he is "anal"; he is intellectual and even ingenuous, to a certain degree, until he goes about uncovering corruption that exists in different procedures in which he is directly involved: for example, the presidential elections or usurpation of authority. Thus it dawns on him that he is able to use his authority for his own designs and file reports that have nothing to do with reality. The novel's ending chronicles his tragic, yet at times comical, descent into madness.

Narrated in a lineal manner the novel thus begins with the report on the first murder that was carried out and from which there will come a series of murders that the assistant district attorney investigated. From this point on the different events of the story will become known owing to conversations the main character has with others and the reports filed by this prosecutor.

One ought to be reminded that the novel can be understood as a place where different facts are given expression, on one hand as a faithful rendition as they took place, or by use of fiction on the other. Upon reading one can find that the novel reviewed touches on topics that positively have occurred and are validated in detailing events of Uchuraccay, the Quechua Indian myth of the Inkarrí as related cogently by Father Quiroz, festivals like the fertility rite and Turu pukllay (indigenous bullfight)[1] (cf., photo ), the Holy Week processions, in mentioning the terrorist practice of hanging dogs from street lamps. The author also bases a character named Edith, albeit quite loosely, on an actual Senderista martyr of the same first name (Edith Lagos), who was the daughter of a prosperous local businessman and sprung from jail in a Senderista raid on the Centro de Reclusión y Adaptación Social (CRAS) de Huamanga (Penitentiary and Social Change Center of Huamanga).

These events definitely occurred in the past and such facts still exist in Ayacucho, and are not a figment of the writer's imagination. A question arises from this commentary: is this novel a resource for historical facts? One should be cautious and keep in mind that the author is not obliged to narrate facts according to the truth; but rather it depends on how he wishes to handle it, by exaggerating it or playing it down. Besides, one should keep in mind the author's note that says:

“The methods for Senderista attacks described in this book, as well as the counterterrorism strategy of investigation, torture and making people disappear are real. Much of the characters’ dialogue is, in effect, quoted from documents from Shining Path or from the statements of terrorists, officials and members of Peruvian armed forces who took part in the conflict. The dates for Holy Week in 2000 and the description of the celebration are also true. Nevertheless, all of the characters as well as the majority of situations and places mentioned here, are fiction, including the factual details that have been removed from context of place, time and meaning. This novel narrates, as do all, a story that could have happened, but the author does not attest to it having been thus.”

In other words, maybe the events happened, maybe they did not.

Along another plane, the narrative stage upon which Red April unfolds is in Ayacucho:

“Ayacucho is a strange place. The seat of the Wari culture was here, and then the Chanka people, who never allowed themselves to be subjugated by the Incas. And later were the indigenous uprisings because Ayacucho was the half-way point between Cuzco, the Inca capital, and Lima, the Spaniards’ capital. And independence in Quinua (cf., Quinua, Peru). And Sendero. This place is condemned to be bathed in blood and fire forever, Chacaltana.”(Roncagliolo, p. 245 Spanish edition).

Although there is a slight relation to the capital city, given that the main character despite having been born in the southern city, at the age of nine departed to be reared by relatives in Lima after his mother's death, but later decides to voluntarily return to his place of birth. His opinion of Lima is not very high since he considers it quite competitive, the source of popular consensus and, at the same time, full of smog, and arid gray hills in some parts. Ironically, the protagonist finds his roots planted in Ayacucho, Lima and Cuzco, the latter city being the birthplace of his estranged father and deceased mother.

The novel spins thematic currents by interweaving the writer's creative story telling content of a thriller novel with the context of Andean life and world view, and the elements Pre-Columbian Incan anthropology.