I hadn't read an Isabel Allende novel in so long I had forgotten what an experience her writing is. It's lyrical, poetic, so wholly sensual you can't help but get lost in it. I sunk into it like I would sink sighing into a warm bubble bath I hadn't even known I was anticipating. 
 It seemed a bit shorter than her other novels, or maybe I just devoured it too quickly even as I tried to savor it, but it didn't diminish the experience. The pacing was just right, everything revealed in it's own time and way. The characters were, as always, meticulously well-rounded and flawed. And, of course, the writing is spectacular as ever. I adored it.