in San Juan del Sur. Nice job, guys, felicidades!

In his first novel, Bernardo and the Virgin (Northwestern University Press, 2007), Sirias takes the reader to the village of Cuapa, Chontales, in central Nicaragua. The book fictionalizes the story of a campesino to whom the Holy Virgin appeared in 1980 while providing a vivid slice of recent history through the eyes of everyday Nicas.

His latest book, Meet Me Under the Ceiba (Arte Publico Press, 2009, winner of the Chicano/Latino Literary Prize), is also a work of fiction. It takes place in the tiny twin villages of La Curva and Pio XII, in the hills south of the capital. Maybe I’m biased since I actually lived in Pio XII as a Peace Corps trainee in 1998 (as Sirias writes, “…very few people in Managua had even heard of this miserable little town”), and I can vouch for the book’s authenticity. Ceiba is based on a true crime that occurred in 1999, and on the intolerance of Nicaraguan culture to homosexuality. I wrote a short review of his book here, then had the opportunity to sit down with the author (he in Panama, where he teaches literature, and me in Colorado).

Enjoy:

JB: I’ve been to the places you’ve written about in your books and I’m amazed by your simple-yet-accurate portrayal of these communities and the characters. Is part of your goal with these books to give readers a true Nicaraguan experience by showing them the thousand little details that makes it such a unique country? Or is the setting always secondary to your narrative?

SS: My top priority when writing a novel is develop a strong plot—the storyline has to hold a reader’s interest from the opening sentence through the concluding one.  But I’m also convinced that a good tale must have interesting characters; and interesting characters require an interesting setting.  So, as you can see, the setting is a key ingredient in my fictional mosaic.  But I also want the reader to experience life in Nicaragua as vividly as possible.  As you well know, Josh, Nicaragua is a place of wonders.  Yet for me to take the reader there successfully story, character, setting, and cultural authenticity must each be dealt with meticulously, as well as lovingly.

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I just saw Invictus, so sports-politics combo is on my mind. Here's a recent TIME magazine piece by Granada-based journalist Tim Rogers on a related subject: 

Can U.S. Baseball Diplomacy Get the Save in Nicaragua?

"I think the State Department is coming to realize, belatedly, that [baseball] can be a very effective tool in public diplomacy," Callahan told TIME. In the case of the U.S. and Nicaragua, he said, "of all the things that unite us, I think the great sport of baseball is the most important."