Isabel Allende in Order, Book 1: The House of the Spirits

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Every great love affair with an author starts somewhere. With Isabel Allende, it starts here, with her first novel and still her most famous.

Isabel Allende is one of my favorite authors, and this series goes through her books one at a time, in the order she wrote them.

What is The House of the Spirits about?

It is the story of the Trueba family across four generations in an unnamed South American country that is clearly Chile. There is Esteban Trueba, proud and hot-tempered; his wife Clara, who sees the future and talks to spirits; their daughter Blanca and her forbidden love; and their granddaughter Alba.

It's full of magic, family secrets, great love and politics, and it ends during the coup that changed Chile forever. The last part is heavy, but the women in this book are unforgettable.

How it began

In 1981, living in exile in Caracas, Venezuela, Allende heard that her grandfather was dying in Chile. She started writing him a letter. That letter became this novel, published in 1982. It was made into a 1993 film with Meryl Streep, Jeremy Irons, Glenn Close, Winona Ryder and Antonio Banderas.