World Books Review: Of Violence and Beauty

Colombian author Evelio Rosero has been writing about the miseries of his homeland for three decades now. His novels, many of which take on the internecine wars, kidnappings, murders, and political upheavals of his country, have won numerous awards (including, humorously enough, the National Literature Prize from the Colombian Ministry of Culture). His work is notorious for being brutally realistic, even hyperrealistic, and “The Armies,” which won 2009 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, is no exception.