Eleven Days

by Brianda Domecq

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0826316069
• ISBN13: 9780826316066
• Release Date: January 1995
• Publisher: University of New Mexico Press
• Length: 226 Pages
• Weight: 0.84 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.0" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

"Eleven Days" by Brianda Domecq

This is indeed an unusual and fascinating book as the first reviewer indicated. But the nature of the author was oversimplified there, and it's very relevant to the account. I grew up with Brianda Domecq in Mexico City during the 1950s and played "spin the bottle" with her at many a wild party in the plush home of her half-absent parents. She was beautiful and brash even as a young teenager, and lucky not to have been kidnapped already. Another memory: one winter day in the mid-1960s I was motorcycling in Spain and happened to pass her family's mansion at Jerez, surrounded by scary walls. I rang the bell and asked about her through a mike, but a rough voice told me she was out and to get away from the gate if I valued my life. I did, and I still wonder how, with such a protective past, she was ever swiped. Maybe she wanted to be, or was born to be, or we all can be...

A bit slow at first, but very interesting

This book is a thinly disguised "fictionalization" of something that truly happened in Brianda Domecq's life. I read this book for a Spanish-language book club (in Spanish).At first, I wasn't very interested because I felt like it was just a story of a dingy, wealthy housewife-student who'd gotten kidnapped for money. (Her family has money because they've been producing sherry in Southern Spain for almost 200 years.) I mean, who really cares? But then, as the book progressed, I found myself fascinated by the relationships she established with her kidnappers, particularly El Picaro. Her intelligence and the way she was able to use her femaleness as a means of interacting was very interesting. Her femaleness is almost unequivocally a strength in interacting with her kidnappers in this macho culture (Mexicano).People who haven't been kidnapped (myself included) can't realize or understand how personal the relationship with the kidnappers becomes--the closeness is truly amazing. (Kidnappers had to help Domecq go to the bathroom, for example.) It's hard to think of having such complex emotional connections with people you've actually never met (or seen--she was blindfolded the whole time). Like I said, the book at first seemed a little uninteresting due to her status as a wealthy, privileged woman, but it turned out to be very psychologically gripping. It's interesting to compare the book with Noticias de un Secuestro by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (another fascinating book). His book is great because he gives you an overview of the complex political situation in Columbia and he gives you the perspectives of many "players"--victims, families of victims, kidnappers, and government officials. Brianda Domecq doesn't give you this, and if you've recently read Gabriel Garcia Marquez before you start her book, you'll feel like hers is somewhat ho-hum at first. It focuses on her particular situation and doesn't really delve into politics at all (primarily because the guys who kidnapped her had no politics--they just wanted money), but fortunately the relationship between the narrator and the kidnappers is so fascinating that the lack of a larger political context is irrelevant. Also, unlike the Marquez book, it's a first-person narrative, which gives you special insight into the psychology of the kidnap victim (and her kidnappers).