The Stories of Eva Luna

Analia Torres’s mother dies in childbirth, and her father dies by suicide soon after. Analia is left in the custody of her uncle, Eugenio, who sends her to a school run by the Sisters of the Sacred Heart. Analia lives at this boarding school for 12 years.

Eugenio wants Analia to become a nun. Although she thinks she could be happy as a nun, she defies his wishes because she isn’t sure she can trust him. He visits Analia at school for the first time when she is 16. He admires her beauty and tells her that she will begin receiving an allowance from her parents’ estate now that she is 16. He will continue to manage the farm and house that they left her. Analia continues to distrust her uncle’s motives. She tells him that his help will only be necessary until she marries.

Soon, Analia’s cousin, Luis (Eugenio’s son), starts writing her letters. She resists reading or responding to them at first, but over time, the pen pals develop an affectionate relationship. Analia has never met Luis in person, and she imagines he must be an ugly man “because it seem[s] impossible that so fine a sensibility and such a clear mind should be combined with a handsome appearance” (231). Analia falls in love with Luis through their letters.

On her 18th birthday, Luis visits Analia at school, and she is surprised to find that he’s handsome. They are married soon after. Analia quickly grows to hate her husband, who doesn’t show any of the thoughtfulness that was evident in his letters. They live on the property that Analia’s parents left her, which Uncle Eugenio is very involved in managing. Luis is patient with Analia, but they don’t have any true connection. Analia feels deceived and lonely.

They have a son. As the years grow by, the tension between Analia and Luis grows until they are “secret enemies.” Luis retreats into alcohol misuse, and Analia takes a more active role in managing the property, although she is still under her Uncle’s thumb.

Analia’s son attends school in town. He stays there during the week, then comes home for the weekend. When Analia receives his first report card along with a letter from his teacher, she is “elated.” It will be revealed at the end of the story that she is so happy because she recognizes the teacher’s handwriting and tone—this is the man who wrote the letters that made her fall in love with her husband.

Luis dies after suffering an injury while drunk. Uncle Eugenio encourages Analia to move to the capital with her son and leave him in charge of the property. She refuses and sends him away instead.

Analia successfully manages the family farm and property. After she settles into her new routine, she pays her son a surprise visit at school and asks to meet his teacher. When she asks him about the letters, he confesses to writing them for his friend, Luis. He asks for her forgiveness at the end of the story. The implication is that they start a relationship.

“Phantom Palace” opens with a description of Spanish conquistadors arriving in Quinaroa, seizing control of land on which Indigenous people had been living for centuries. Over the years, the Indigenous people who were not killed or enslaved moved into the jungle, living quiet lives and surviving by remaining hidden.

The story describes how over the centuries, the trades for coffee, cocoa, bananas, and oil have thrived, but most of the country’s inhabitants remain impoverished. The wealth is held by a small upper class and the dictatorial regime of El Benefactor. In the capital city, there are signs of modernization and wealth. In the countryside, progress is much slower.

El Benefactor decides to build a summer house outside the town of San Jerónimo. Railroad tracks are built to connect San Jerónimo to the capital city, and it takes four years to construct the house and surrounding gardens. The dictator throws a huge party at the house to celebrate. Parties are not his usual style—he sees women, alcohol, and other diversions as signs of weakness—so after the big party, the house goes mostly unused.

People begin to stealthily move into the house; as the narrator describes it: “the invisible Indians slowly retur[n] to occupy their territory” (245). Servants notice food disappearing and signs of people having been in the clean rooms, but they don’t say anything to the guards for fear of repercussions. Never seeing any of the intruders, people start to think that there must be something magical happening in the house. The servants and guards decide to stick to one wing, leaving the rest of it completely to the unseen intruders.

Ambassador Lieberman and his wife, Marcia, arrive in the capital city from Vienna. When they meet El Benefactor for dinner, the dictator becomes infatuated with Marcia. Although El Benefactor is very old and not physically attractive, Marcia pities him and is drawn by the challenge of developing a relationship with this notoriously cold man. El Benefactor takes her to one of his country estates, and after her husband searches desperately for her for a month, he returns to Europe. El Benefactor and Marcia become tired and distrustful of one another, but he cannot let her go without causing an international incident.

One day, El Benefactor invites Marcia to his summer house. She is enchanted by the landscape around it, which has been partially overrun by the jungle. Her excitement infuses them both, and they spend a lively few weeks together there. El Benefactor returns to the city, but Marcia stays. She intuits that she is not alone in the house, which comforts her. She doesn’t mind when she finds clothes missing or when someone eats her food. The secretive inhabitants of the house “recogniz[e] her as one of their own” but don’t show themselves (254).

El Benefactor dies, but Marcia stays at the summer house for the rest of her life. Over the years that follow, the jungle swallows the house entirely. People claim that sometimes, after a storm, a marble palace appears beside the road “like a mirage” (257).

A volcanic eruption causes a series of avalanches and mudslides, burying mountainside villages and roads and killing 20,000 people. Rolf Carlé and the narrator, Eva Luna, are in bed when the call comes from the TV station where Rolf works.

The television helicopter flies Rolf into the area hit by the avalanches. He reports live “in the midst of a bedlam of lost children, wounded survivors, corpses, and devastation” (259). Eva watches the broadcast along with the rest of the country.

Rolf is filming when rescue crews discover a 13-year-old girl named Azucena buried up to her neck in mud. Rescuers fail to pull her up because the mud is like quicksand around her. When she tries to grab ropes thrown to her, she only sinks deeper. Rolf fights his way to her and ties the rope around her. She screams when they try to pull her out; she tells them that she is being held by the bodies of her brothers and sisters.

Rolf works determinedly on camera, trying everything that he can think of to free Azucena. He realizes that they need a pump to drain the water and mud from the area. He is told that a pump won’t arrive until the next day. All the while, Eva is watching the broadcast. Knowing Rolf well, she can read the emotions on his face and loves the dedicated, determined way he comforts the girl.

Azucena begs Rolf not to leave her alone overnight, and he agrees to stay with her. He shares his coffee with her, and they talk. Once they have covered everything about their pasts, Rolf starts inventing stories.

Eva goes to the TV station and starts frantically making calls to get the pump Rolf needs. She watches the live footage of Rolf and Azucena, feeling Rolf’s pain intimately. Eva is miserable because she can do nothing to help them, even as she watches them so closely.

Another day passes. On the second night, Rolf feels memories and traumas that he has buried rise to the surface of his mind. He recalls his experiences in Austria during and after World War II, where he witnessed horrible cruelty. He remembers being abused by his father. He realizes that he has spent his adult life trying to run from these terrible memories. He begins to feel like he is Azucena, buried and dying. In the morning, Azucena tells Rolf not to cry for her, saying that she isn’t in pain anymore. “I’m not crying for you,” he tells her, “I’m crying for myself. I hurt all over” (268).

On the third day, the President visits the area. He announces that it will be impossible to collect all the bodies, so the whole valley will be blessed by priests as a mass grave. He addresses Azucena on camera. Rolf interrupts to ask for a pump. The President promises to look into it.

Eva sees when Rolf gives up hope, kissing Azucena on the forehead and telling her he loves her dearly. Eva had just secured a pump and it was to be delivered the next day. However, on the third night, Azucena dies.

In the final paragraph of the story, Eva speaks directly to Rolf. She tells him that he changed that night, and she will wait by his side as he processes his grief and trauma.