Isabel Allende On Latest Novel: "There's Always Something Personal In What I Write"

In Isabel Allende's latest novel, the Chilean author didn't need to go very far for inspiration. Her protagonist in Violeta—the fiercely independent Violeta del Valle—was inspired in part by the author's mother, Francisca Panchita Llona Barrios, who passed away in 2018, aged 97. "There is always something personal in what I write because my raw material is my memory and the experiences I have accumulated throughout my life," Allende, 79, tells People Chica. "To create characters that are not cartoons but human beings with the complexities and contradictions that we all have, I look for role models."

Allende's novel, published by Ballantine Books and on sale January 25, starts with a bang. Violeta is born during a stormy night in 1920 and immediately slips through her aunt's hands during the delivery, landing on the wooden floor of her home in southern Chile. "She has an egg in her forehead!" announces her father, Arsenio del Valle, upon first seeing his daughter's sizable bump.

Violeta's birth coincides with the arrival of the Spanish flu in South America and precedes her family's fall from grace during the Great Depression. In a long letter to her grandson Camilo—with touches of Allende's magical realism sprinkled throughout—Violeta shares her childhood in the countryside, her passionate love affairs, complicated motherhood, remarkable friendships and brushes with some of the most dramatic events of the 20th century: World War II, the military dictatorships in Chile and Argentina and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Cover of Isabel Allende's latest novel Violeta, out now:

Feminism and women's rights, both close to Allende's heart, also have starring roles in this saga. "We must always be vigilant," she says. "All it takes is some pretext like war, occupation, fanaticism [or] catastrophe for women to lose their rights. However, I'm convinced that feminism will not be defeated, and in the very near future we will be able to replace the patriarchy with a world in which men and women, in equal numbers and with equal power, will be able to make decisions."