"Space Invaders" by Nona Fernandez

Space Invaders is an odd, little (very little) book. I sort of feel like a kid cheating at a book report project writing about it. That's because the book is short: we're talking only seventy pages, and that's with generous spacing between chapters and sections. For that reason, Space Invaders has more of the feel of a short story. I'm left wanting the larger work--to see how it connects to broader themes--instead of groping around with the little I'm given.

Part of that frustration probably results from my own deficiencies in knowledge. The novel centers on the childhood experiences of a group of students during Augusto Pinochet's 1973-1989 military dictatorship (I looked up that fact in an NPR article on the book, which tells you everything about my lack of knowledge). Throughout the book, the children react to their feelings about Estrella, a peer and daughter of a national police agent (yup, stole that from the article too). From that perspective, the innocent qualities of childhood--crushes, mundane classroom experiences--are contrasted against the political brutality happening outside (though filtering into) the classroom. However, the children's experiences are primarily told through dreams, rather than hard memories, lending an air of mythical uncertainty to the whole experience.

So that's a lot, especially for a calling-it-seventy-pages-really-is-cheating novel. There's also an analogy to the old Space Invaders video game that I didn't quite get. 

I think I need a reread.