Reviews
Bernardo and the Virgin

Bernardo stands head and shoulders above other books about Nicaragua for sheer originality, real-life texture, and ingenious use of voices and characters. This historical novel tells the true story of the Virgin Mary’s appearances to a campesino in Cuapa, while portraying a thick slice of Nicaragua’s past and present. If you only have time to read one book before your trip, this may be the one.




Do you believe in miracles? I mean miracles of the religious variety. Never mind—it’s not a prerequisite for reading this book, Bernardo and the Virgin by Silvio Sirias, but if you have a tendency to believe, particularly if you happen to be Catholic, this story may send a holy shiver down your spine... (Sirias) turns out to be a great storyteller with a knack for creating characters.




What Sirias had before him was the challenge to accurately describe the events in Cuapa while still being true to the transcendent quality of Bernardo’s experience. He does so to great effect... This is a sweeping novel. It tells numerous delightful and emotional stories involving other appealing characters in Bernardo's world... The details of Bernardo's Nicaragua are wholly entertaining and enticing, with images of Catholic mysticism juxtaposed against the particulars of life in the dusty village of Cuapa. Sirias' prose is lovely.




(Sirias's) novel succeeds... By demonstrating the magic in everyday rural Nicaragua, this tale of religious mysticism is elevated from the unattainable buried headline —"villagers see image of Virgin Mary"— to a story of faith, politics, love, and loss, which we all can understand.




(W)hat we come away with in the end is an understanding of Nicaraguans during the latter part of the twentieth century: their sufferings and longings, their losses and hopes, their mysticism and bawdiness, their idealism and resignation. The author writes that he hopes to “give readers some insight into what it has meant to be a Nicaraguan during such tumultuous times.” In this entertaining and moving novel, he has done so splendidly.




...(A) gem... The beauty of Bernardo and the Virgin is Sirias’ seriousness in his approach to the subject matter. He takes the apparitions and surrounding tales—including miracles reported—at face value. And he imbues these tales with the faith and love one would expect from a visionary without degenerating into pietistic platitudes... God works in mysterious ways. Bernardo, in real life or in fiction, is testament to that.




In the book, Bernardo and the Virgin, Silvio Sirias tells Bernardo Martinez’s story in a unique and refreshing way... The story is not only about Bernardo, but explores the faith and passion of the Nicaraguan people themselves—from their entertaining superstitions and rituals, their passion for la Virgencita and the Catholic faith, their desire for a better life and the romantic yet unfulfilled notions of the Sandinista Revolution and what it would bring to a people too long silenced and repressed by a cruel dictatorship. Bernardo and the Virgin is ultimately about goodness—goodness that in the end will triumph over evil. Bravo Silvio!




Bernardo and the Virgin is a gargantuan book, full of beauty and wonder, by a newcomer I think will garner lots of attention. Of course, the comparisons will fly between Mr. Sirias and some of his fellow Latin American writers like García Márquez, Alejo Carpentier, Alvaro Mutis, Jorge Amado—all great company, I say, if one is to keep such company, though this book is not fitting so quickly into the magical realism school. There’s much more at work here, including a mysticism that is reminiscent of Paulo Coelho and Rudolfo Anaya... I think Bernardo and the Virgin will join the ranks of other memorable books written by folks like Francisco Goldman, Jaime Manrique, Mayra Montero, and others who are getting noticed... This book has a strong literary backbone, but it is highly entertaining as well. It is an adventure of the first order, a journey that will appeal to a wide range of reader.




Contact Silvio Sirias at silvio@silviosirias.com
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