Rating: 
Summary: Liked the Story, but Not the Way in Which It Was Written
Review: I loved the story in this book but I didn't care for the writing style. Isabel Allende is a former journalist and, like most journalists, she tells her stories rather than dramatizing them in scenes. There is very little dialogue in the book because of this, just Allende "telling" us the story of the del Valle family through the "voice" of her narrator, Aurora del Valle.The book takes place in San Francisco's Chinatown, in Peru and mostly, in Chile, something I really enjoyed. The book actually begins before Aurora's birth, though it is Aurora who tells the story, many years later, from Chile. As in most of Allende's books, women dominate. Women are the strong figures, the ones who matter, the ones who take center stage. The men, for the most part, just seem to hover at the periphery. In PORTRAIT IN SEPIA, however, one man is very fully drawn...Aurora's maternal grandfather, Tao Chi'en, and he is a fascinating and likable figure. PORTRAIT IN SEPIA encompasses a large cast of characters and is, in many ways, a family novel. Tao Chi'en and his wife, Eliza Sommers, who live in Chinatown, have a daughter, Lynn, a gorgeous woman who has an affair with Matias del Valle. When Lynn becomes pregnant, Matias, who doesn't have his sights set on fatherhood, leaves and Lynn dies in childbirth. Lynn's daughter, Aurora, is raised for a short time by Tao Chi'en and Eliza, but circumstances force Eliza to give Aurora to her paternal grandmother, Paulina del Valle. Paulina del Valle is a larger-than-life character. She's rich, she's eccentric, she ostentatious, she's irreverent. She lives like a man at a time when it was greatly frowned upon for a woman to live like a man, but...Paulina lives like a man better than most men do. When her fortune begins to run low, Paulina gathers up her butler (who becomes more than a butler) and five-year-old Aurora and heads for Santiago where money goes a lot further. There, we learn more about Aurora's father, Matias, her uncle Severo and his cousin, Nivea. When Aurora arrives in Chile, she is only five years old. When she is narrating her story, she is three decades older and much has happened. Allende has filled PORTRAIT IN SEPIA with larger-than-life themes...love, lust, betrayal, lies, family loyalty...but somehow they don't come off larger-than-life; they come off as being very intimate. I think part of the problem for me was the way Allende chose to tell her story...and I mean "telling" rather than "showing." This gave a very "muted" tone to the book, which tied in well with the title but definitely left something lacking. I found it very difficult to get emotionally involved with the characters. I often felt as though I were reading a newspaper article rather than a novel. I did love the fact that Chile, itself, often took center stage in this book. Chile is a fascinating place and most of Allende's best writing is done when describing her native country. Don't expect a book like those of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, though, simply because most of PORTRAIT IN SEPIA is set in South America. There is no magic realism in this book and Chile is a very different place than is Colombia. You won't find the hot, steamy, melancholy jungles of Garcia Marquez here. Instead, Chile is a land of volcanoes and snowy mountaintops, forests and lakes. It's cool more than it's hot. But it's fascinating and the look at Chilean history Allende gives us is just as fascinating as is the story of the del Valle family and Tao Chi'en. Maybe more. Most of the time, I enjoyed reading PORTRAIT IN SEPIA. I did find all the "telling" to be a bit tiresome and ponderous, though, and I wish Allende would learn to dramatize her stories in scenes rather than simply relating them to us in such a journalistic, factual manner. I would recommend PORTRAIT IN SEPIA to fans of Allende without hesitation. I think others are going to be a bit disappointed in the book. Don't expect anything like HOUSE OF THE SPIRITS, though. This a very different sort of book and one that is much more "down-to-earth."
Rating: 
Summary: Just great!
Review: I loved this book because the plot takes place both in Latin America and the USA. Isabel Allende uses a great plot to tell San Francisco's history, and its relation to so many immigrants. She makes a great description of the old times in San Francisco, and the old times in Chile. You will learn about how San Francisco became what it is now. It talks about a specific family, but that is the story of thousands of families that migrated to the USA. Allende's description corresponds to that of a Latin American who loves the USA. She makes a perfect link between these two world.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointment and Revelation!
Review: I read Daughter of Fortune and Portrait in Sepia both in the audio versions. Our book group is enamored of Isabel Allende and we have done most of her books. I was the only member disappointed in Daughter of Fortune; I felt bored and let down. But I couldn't say why. Half way through Portrait in Sepia I suddenly realized why it, too, was boring me. The book is written in a way that most writing teachers eschew. They say "show the reader, don't just tell." And Allende tells a lot, spins a good yarn, creates suspense, etc. But none of the characters are real to me because I am not in their heads; I am seeing them having their adventures and am told about their reactions. But I do not experience what they experience first hand as I feel I do in other books I really enjoy. When I finished Daughter of Fortune I wondered why I had persisted and felt a little foolish, as though I had been led on. Halfway through Portrait in Sepia I felt the same and so I stopped reading and returned the book. I clearly am in the minority in my opinion about this book. I loved House of the Spirits and had great hopes for the rest of the trilogy. I was disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: The title says it all
Review: I read this book at an extremely leisurely pace: a few pages at a time, over the course of weeks. Strangely enough, Allende's novel seems perfect for this kind of catch-as-catch-can type of reading. It doesn't have the narrative drive of a book you can't put down, but it has the characters and history to keep you returning. In many ways, this novel is less of a story than a portrait of characters that have largely appeared elsewhere in her fiction, although it's not necessary to have read these other books. The emphasis is unequivocably on the del Valles, with Paulina del Valle the most memorable. Paulina is the glue that holds everything together. Other characters, equally well drawn, appear strongly in some sections, then vanish into the background, thus shifting the attention back to Paulina. Not surprisingly, the most elusive character is the narrator, Aurora, who is also the photographer, both literally and metaphorically. The story is filtered through her lens - her experience, perceptions, and ideas. The "sepia" part of the title refers to the historical/nostalgic atmosphere of the novel. Allende takes her characters through the San Francisco of Gold Rush times and through turbulent times in Chile during war and the rise of women's rights. Here, everything is a memory. The plot? The novel traces Aurora del Valle's life, from the times leading up to her conception to the moment when, as an adult, she is given back the crucial memory that has subconsciously defined her. You won't find a single driving conflict here; even Aurora's perplexity about her mysterious dream surfaces only now and then. Instead, you will find a family album, complete with the syphilitic uncle, the feminist aunt who is always pregnant, the gluttonous and proud matriarch, and the butler rumored to be a nobleman who scandalously marries into the family. Allende writes with confidence and skill, sometimes overdoing the prose but quickly righting herself. Her circuitous approach to this story - attacking different moments and events from various directions, shifting in and out of times, mixing bits of stories from several characters - makes this novel one to sit with for a while. Fans of her early fiction will be disappointed about the lack of magic realism, but her hand with detail and characterization remains as steady as always. I recommend this novel for Allende fans and readers of character-driven fiction. Readers who expect a driving narrative, however, will find this work lacking.
Rating:
Summary: Very Good Story
Review: I read this not expecting to like it, but it was very good. I have since read other Isabel Allende books, and love her writing style. She gets into the heart of a woman and you can't put the book down. This was a very good story with a history to follow. How the life of a young woman was started and where she went in life. It took you on a journey through her life with grandparents and a sham of a marriage and her survival through it all. Loved it!
Rating:
Summary: Fine character development and sense of time and place
Review: I really enjoyed "Daughter of Fortune" and looked forward to reading this 2001 sequel. I wasn't disappointed. Ms. Allende is a fine storyteller. It must have been difficult for her to weave the important elements of the two books together but it all fell together flawlessly. Again, I was swept into the story, which starts out in San Francisco and moves back to Chile, where the saga or these characters first began. The historical detail and the setting of time and place fascinated me. And so did the development of the characters who sprung to life from the pages. There's Aurora del Valle, the granddaughter of two very powerful women. One is the heroine of the prior book, a woman who followed one love to California but found another. And the other is the wealthy Paulina del Valle, a large woman whose business sense created a fortune for her family. Both are very different and both love their granddaughter, who gradually learns the depth of their love as well as the family secrets. There's tragedy in this book as well as romance. There's war and peace. And there are lots of contrasts between the places that are so well drawn that I felt I was actually living there. There's also a resolution as we look forward to the future of the characters in 20th century. Hopefully, the author will continue the story. Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Fine character development and sense of time and place
Review: I really enjoyed "Daughter of Fortune" and looked forward to reading this 2001 sequel. I wasn't disappointed. Ms. Allende is a fine storyteller. It must have been difficult for her to weave the important elements of the two books together but it all fell together flawlessly. Again, I was swept into the story, which starts out in San Francisco and moves back to Chile, where the saga or these characters first began. The historical detail and the setting of time and place fascinated me. And so did the development of the characters who sprung to life from the pages. There's Aurora del Valle, the granddaughter of two very powerful women. One is the heroine of the prior book, a woman who followed one love to California but found another. And the other is the wealthy Paulina del Valle, a large woman whose business sense created a fortune for her family. Both are very different and both love their granddaughter, who gradually learns the depth of their love as well as the family secrets. There's tragedy in this book as well as romance. There's war and peace. And there are lots of contrasts between the places that are so well drawn that I felt I was actually living there. There's also a resolution as we look forward to the future of the characters in 20th century. Hopefully, the author will continue the story. Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Show Don't Tell
Review: I really liked the story this book told but I didn't like the fact that Allende chose to tell all of it rather than dramatizing it in scenes. I didn't dislike the protagonist, Aurora del Valle, but I found it difficult to like her and sympathize with her. I found her to be far too passive in many situations, something could have probably been remedied had Allende "shown" us the story rather than "told" us. The character who "stole the book" was definitely Aurora's grandmother, Paulina del Valle. Paulina was a larger-than-life character who added a much-needed note of humor to an otherwise flat and unemotional book. The lack of emotion in this book was something I didn't understand. There were plenty of places for Allende to write rich, dramatic set-pieces yet, for some reason, she chose not to do so, much to the detriment of her story. Bottomline: I enjoyed reading "Portrait in Sepia" but I would have enjoyed it a lot more had Allende followed the storyteller's maxim of "show, don't tell." This book could have been superlative. As it is, it is just okay.
Rating:
Summary: Writing that flows like chocolate melts in your mouth
Review: I really liked the way the words flowed together to make a visual picture of what the author was describing. Another thing I liked was that the imagination the author used to create her characters. These characters were unique and stood out from the norm. The different cultures added an exotic flare. With the grandfather being Chinese, practising herbs, energy work and the beliefs of Karma and reincarnation. The two grandmothers also had individual personalities one being extravagantly rich and an entreprenur. The other a pastry maker with a big eye for adventure. This was not your run of the mill romance novel. Each character seemed to have something special about them. The story is written by Aurora the grandchild of Chilian, Spanish, Chinese and American blood. She herself is interested in photography and writing. It makes you wonder if this story is borrowed from the authors own history. This is a story of how her life unfolds with all her relatives taking a major part in the telling. There are episodes of war, romance, intrigue and wealth all intertwined with alot of new age sentiments thrown in. It is pretty obvious the writer knows about intuition and uses Aurora to model these principles. The last page really got me I loved the way how she used the title to make a rich point at the end of her narrative, Aurora's narrative. This was a splendid story and I recommend it to men and women, but it might be more of a woman's book, because it is about a woman. Definately a winner! ...
Rating:
Summary: Allende just keeps getting better
Review: I think this is an excellent sequel that also acts as a kind of prequel to House of Spirits. The way all of Allende's novels are connected is wonderful. The story was great, told through the flashbacks of Eliza Sommers' granddaughter. Because these are her memories of a disjointed past, the story is rough in spots and jumps forward and back in time, but is still compelling. I definitely recommend reading Daughter of Fortune first.
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