Book description
They say Frasquita knows magic, that she is a healer with occult
powers, that perhaps she is a sorcerer. She does indeed possess a
remarkable gift, one that has been passed down to the women in her
family for generations. From rags, off-cuts, and rough fabric she can
create gowns and other garments so magnificent, so alive, that they
are capable of masking any kind defect or deformity (and
pregnancies!). They bestow a breathtaking and blinding beauty on
whoever wears them. But Frasquita's gift makes others in her small
Andalusian village jealous. And to make matters worse, Frasquita is an
adulteress (it matters not that her betrayal came at her husband's
behest after he gambled her honour, and lost, at a cock fight). She is
hounded and eventually banished from her home. What follows is an
extraordinary adventure as she travels across southern Spain all the
way to Africa with her five children in tow. Her exile becomes a quest
for a better life for herself and her daughters, whom she hopes can
escape the ironclad fate of her family of sorcerers. The Threads of
the Heart possesses the lyric beauty of a prose poem and the narrative
power of a myth.
