Infinite Country

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2021

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-4

Chapters 5-9

Chapters 10-14

Chapters 15-18

Chapters 19-23

Chapters 24-30

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Important Quotes

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Chapters 10-14Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 10 Summary

Engel begins the chapter by relating Mauro’s thoughts upon hearing of Talia’s assault of a man with burning oil. He toys with the idea that she is possessed by a demonic force, which leads to a discussion of the demons that recovering alcoholics have claimed to experience in the Alcoholics Anonymous meetings he has attended over the years. The narrator notes that many of these recovering alcoholics and addicts were former soldiers and guerillas who seemed to lose their purpose in life as the civil war ground to a halt: “The antidote to disgrace, according to even the atheists in the group, was humility and prayer” (74). Mauro has attained 10 years of sobriety.

The narrative moves to a discussion of Perla’s sense that an evil spirit had invaded her home once when Talia was quite young. She is telling this story to Mauro when she is older and ill and wants him to promise that he will never bring evil spirits into the house. To banish the demonic power, Perla ended up bringing in a folk despojo—exorcist—of great power. This would have been a direct contradiction of Perla’s Catholic beliefs except that the exorcist herself had allegedly been exorcised and was now working for the good side. The evil spirit was banished.

In the following section, Mauro receives a call from the reformatory telling him about Talia’s having masterminded the escape and warning him that he must turn her over to the authorities if she returns home. Mauro acknowledges the request, though he is secretly proud of Talia’s resourcefulness and hopes this means she will be returning to him and taking her flight to the United States. He reflects on the growing number of calls between Elena and himself as the time for Talia’s departure has grown closer. He has concealed Talia’s absence, making excuses about her inability to speak on the phone while enjoying the chance to speak to Elena.

The chapter closes with Mauro recalling a day trip he took with Elena and the infant Karina to a serene mountain wilderness where a powerful sense of presence overwhelmed them. He linked this experience to the idea that they were close to the place where Chiminigagua, the Andean Creator, brought the world into being, a place where wishes could be granted: “He told Elena they should turn their backs to the lake, holding in their hands an imaginary ball of sunlight, conjure their deepest desire, face the lake bellow, and blow their golden wishes to water below” (80).

Chapter 11 Summary

After Mauro’s deportment, Elena experiences desolation in her first few months alone with two small children. She broods about the events leading up to her isolation and recognizes how only slightly different decisions could have changed the results. She is forced to leave the good lodging she shared with Yamira because of the conflict Mauro had with Dante. Her new, Spartan dwelling exposes her to perverse humiliation and an extremely marginalized living experience.

Elena begins to have nightmares once again. Many of them center around reports she heard of a Colombian volcanic disaster that resulted in the slow death of a trapped child, Omayra. In many of her dreams, Elena envisions herself as the child. Then she dreams she is a bird, flying away from the chaos below.

Chapter 12 Summary

The narrator describes the indignities and inconvenience visited upon Mauro and Elena as a result of his arrest and deportation. Elena is unable to see him before he is flown out of the country. The harshness of their conditions makes Elena euphorically recall their lives in Colombia and dream of the family being reunited there. She has dreams in which she envisions Mauro’s capriciousness endangering her family and children. Living now in Sandy Hill, New Jersey, surrounded by other diasporic mothers, Elena realizes her situation is not uncommon. The women bond and share their wisdom about surviving and caring for their families.

Elena establishes contact with Mauro through her mother. Repatriated to Colombia, Mauro spends most of his time drinking, filled with remorse about how he has brought about the dissolution of his family. Elena comes to realize that in order to provide for her children, she must send the infant Talia to Perla in Colombia. The baby would travel with Gema, a Colombian woman she knows. The separation of mother and child is devastating for both, something from which Elena will not recover.

Chapter 13 Summary

This chapter gives a chronological description of Mauro’s spiritual journey. He reflects on his childhood digging graves and the Andean mythology that captivated and inspired him. In searching for Jairo, the patron of his adolescence, he is confronted by thugs in the old neighborhood who tell him that Jairo was killed years before by the police.

With no sense of anywhere to go, Mauro returns to Perla’s neighborhood and lives as an alcoholic street person, occasionally sobering up enough to present himself to Perla and visit with his child. As Talia grows, his desire to be part of her life increases, and “[…] the sight of this daughter growing each day beside her grandmother kept him alive” (97).

The ultimate turn for Mauro comes when he meets Ximena, a woman who invites him to a recovery shelter. Counseling with her, he realizes the ultimate source of his pain and disappointment: his abandonment by Karina, his mother. As he emerges from his alcoholic stupor, Perla informs him that Elena has found a good job working in a restaurant, and it fills him with jealousy and dread that Elena is moving into a full life without him.

Chapter 14 Summary

Elena’s new job referred to in the previous chapter is not so wonderful. She cleans bathrooms for a fly-by-night restauranteur who makes her work an entire probationary month without pay, causing her to be indebted to many around her.

On a harrowing winter night, alone at the restaurant, her boss rapes her. Shocked and helpless, she asks him why he has done this, and he responds that he does not know, saying, “I’m usually not attracted to mothers” (102).

Suffering physically and emotionally after the attack, Elena solicits advice from her close friend Toya, only to be told she has no recourse for what happened. After praying to the Virgen de Chiquinquirá that she did not become pregnant, “she cried when her period finally came” (103).

The chapter concludes with a description of the first Christmas Elena spends apart from Mauro, celebrating with her children in the crowded home in Sandy Hill and speaking to Mauro over the telephone. Elena takes comfort in a Colombian fable about a mother and daughter brutally murdered by a madman who are eventually reunited in the afterlife.

Chapters 10-14 Analysis

Chapter 10 is a confluence of the four religions described in the book being put into practice. Talia’s attack on Horatio and Perla’s need to exorcise the evil spirit in her home brings their underlying civil religious perceptions into sharp focus. Before she will authorize—and pay for—the civil exorcist to cleanse her home, however, Perla has to be assured that this witch doctor is actually a practicing Catholic. In his Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, Mauro and other men, some recovering from unbelievably desperate circumstances, offer prayers of supplication and seek help from a higher power that, for many of them, remains amorphous, even when the help they seek comes to them. The chapter closes by revealing the sweeping power of Andean animism with Mauro and his young family observing the magnificence of a sunset reminiscent of the dawn of creation. Each of the four religions plays a significant role in helping the family cope with the capriciousness of the world. In a bit of literary parallelism, Talia’s clever escape, related after the story of Perla’s cleansing of her home, is symbolic to Mauro that his daughter’s demon has been exorcized and that she is both literally and symbolically on her way home.

This section details the harshness and indignities faced by the separated mother and father. Left to her own devices, Elena is quick to learn to cope. Mauro, on the other hand, cannot forgive himself and wastes years riddled with guilt. Elena’s ability to send Talia to Perla is symbolic of Elena’s being able to let go and move forward for the sake of others in her family. She does what must be done. Mauro cannot let go of his guilt and remorse. It is only the chance encounter with Ximena that enables him to deal with his great, initial loss—his mother—so that he can face the reality of his disease and begin to recover. The loss of his mother is juxtaposed against regaining his daughter: Mauro finds life in deciding he will not lose his daughter as he lost his mother.