Leonor

The Story of a Lost Childhood

Paula Delgado-Kling

$47.95 $42.96

Paperback

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English

OR Books
12 March 2024

Biography: historical, political & military; History of the Americas; Violence in society; Irregular or guerrilla forces & warfare

Set in the author’s homeland, Colombia, this is the heartbreaking story of Leonor, former child soldier of the FARC, a rural guerrilla group.

Paula Delgado-Kling followed Leonor for nineteen years, from shortly after she was an active member of the FARC forced into sexual slavery by a commander thirty-four years her senior, through her rehabilitation and struggle with alcohol and drug addiction, to more recent days as the mother of two girls.

Leonor’s physical beauty, together with resourcefulness and imagination in the face of horrendous circumstances, helped her carve a space for herself in a male-dominated world. She never stopped believing that she was a woman of worth and importance. It took her many years of therapy to accept that she was also a victim.

Throughout the story of Leonor, Delgado-Kling interweaves the experiences of her own family, involved with Colombian politics since the 19th century and deeply afflicted, too, by the decades of violence there.

By: Paula Delgado-Kling
Imprint: OR Books
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 177mm, Width: 127mm,
ISBN: 9781682194478
ISBN 10: 1682194477
Pages: 250
Publication Date: 12 March 2024
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Paula Delgado-Kling holds degrees in comparative literature/French civilizations, international affairs, and creative writing from Brown, Columbia, and the New School, respectively. Leonor, for which she received two grants from the Canadian Council for the Arts, is her first book. Excerpts of this book have appeared in Narrative, The Literary Review, Pacifica Literary Review, and Happano.org in Japan. Her work for the Mexican monthly news magazine Gatopardo was nominated for the Simon Bolivar Award, Colombia’s top journalism prize, and anthologized in Las Mejores Crónicas de Gatopardo (Random House Mondadori, 2006).

Reviews for Leonor: The Story of a Lost Childhood

"“[A] devastating portrait of unspeakable suffering.” —Kirkus “[Delgado-Kling] spares no one and condemns no one, writing about the country and the people she loves with honesty, grit and generosity. I couldn’t put this book down.” —Luis Jaramillo, author of the novel The Doctor’s Wife “The contrasts between Delgado-Kling’s and Leonor’s lives are stark, but the author’s capacity to bridge that distance both indicates her ambition as a writer and serves as a reminder of the utter pervasiveness of trauma.” —Emily Nemens, author of The Cactus League “A compelling firsthand account of the greed, social neglect, and deliberate misrule that has forced many Latin American children and families to seek a better life in the arms of terrorist groups.” —Ernesto Quiñonez, author of the novels Bodega Dreams, Chango’s Fire, and Taina: A Novel ""[A] small but gutting work of memoir-meets-biography"" —Elle"