The Hacienda: My Venezuelan Years

(Paperback)

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Description

Married at sixteen to a man twenty years her senior who spoke no English, she was taken to his ancestral home and estate where she found herself living in the most primitive of conditions, isolated and alone. St. Aubin de Teran ended up virtually running the plantation that belonged to her increasingly demented husband but enjoyed learning the mores and magic of a place that had remained practically unchanged for more than a century. Written in mesmerising prose, this is the extraordinary story of a young woman surviving by her wits and fantasies.

Reviews

'She writes with extraordinary vividness and clarity - she faces reality with a courage and skill that left me not knowing which to admire more: her gift as a writer or that she had the guts to carve out a place for herself in such an unforgiving world.' INDEPENDENT 'Powerfully engrossing' OBSERVER 'Astonishing' ELLE 'A remarkable woman, her life story makes for compulsive reading.' THE TIMES 'Strange and more exotic than fiction, this memoir is brilliant.' DAILY MAIL 'A life even more gripping than her own novels.' GUARDIAN 'A fascinating tale from a gifted writer.' WANDERLUST 'St Aubin's extraordinary and, by turns, hilarious and terrifying marriage to an aristocratic Venezuelan bank robber grippingly recounted.' MARIE CLAIRE 'The vivdness with which she recalls the people and the land proved the haceinda continues to haunt her, as it will haunt any reader of this deeply felt, achingly beautiful memoir.' GLASGOW HERALD 'An astonishing tale of self-discovery and survival.' SCOTSMAN 'Lisa St Aubin de Teran... offers a distinctive and elegant lesson to the reader.' INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE 'It is an engaging story, simply told, and Teran is good at conveying the texture of an old and decaying community ruled by tradition and riven with dissent. Her own unhappiness and depression run like a dark thread through the bright South American colours; in the end THE HACIENDA is a sad little book, although one that is worth reading for the beams of light it shines into the shadows of a lost world.' DAILY TELEGRAPH 'Inspirational.' BOOKSELLER 'Absolutely gripping.' SAINSBURY'S MAGAZINE 'her enthusiasm and extraordinary story keep the pages turning.' TATLER

Author Bio

Lisa St. Aubin de Ter n was born in south London in 1953. She is a prize-winning author and has published five novels.