La fiesta del chivo (The Feast of the Goat) » (Spanish-language Edition)

Vargas Llosa, un clásico contemporáneo, relata el fin de un era dando voz, entre otros personajes históricos, al impecable e implacable general Trujillo, apodado el Chivo, y al sosegado y hábil doctor Balaguer (sempiterno presidente de la República Dominicana). Con un ritmo y una precisión difícilmente superables, este peruano universal muestra que la política puede consistir en abrirse camino entre cadáveres, y que un ser inocente puede convertirse en un regalo tenebroso.

English Translation: Vargas Llosa, a classic contemporary, relates the aim of an era giving voice, among other historical personages, to impeccable and implacable general Trujillo, nicknamed Chivo, and to calmed and capable doctor Balaguer (everlasting president of the Dominican Republic). With a hardly superable rate and a precision, this Peruvian universal sample that the policy can consist of laying way between corpses, and that an innocent being can become a gift sinister

Times Literary Supplement

La fiesta del chivo takes as much liberty with history as, say, War and Peace, if not quite as much as The Charterhouse of Parma. Many of the characters, including Trujillo and his family, Balaguer, and the conspirators, are based on historical figures, but fictionalized by Vargas Llosa. He gives us Trujillo's most intimate thoughts, from the moment he wakes up at 4 am to late at night when trying to force a girl. He describes the thoughts of each of the conspirators on the night of the ambush, although many of them did not survive to tell their story. These historical figures are combined with invented characters. Vargas Llosa spent a long time researching his material. He has said that, in writing the novel, he took pains to ensure that everything he described "could" have happened. And no one who knew the Dominican Republic at the time has expressed any doubts about the novel's verisimilitude. Even Joaquin Balaguer has given it his seal of approval.