The Tortilla Curtain

The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle charts the intersecting paths of two married couples living in Los Angeles in the mid-nineties. One is wealthy, and white, and culturally liberal; the other is poor, and Latino, and undocumented. It's an exciting story: the plot turns are violent and dramatic, and the symbolism, while a bit obvious, is thought-provoking. At one point late in the novel, the rich whites literally build a wall around their housing development, so thematically, The Tortilla Curtain aligns exactly with our moment.

Half of Boyle's novel is a ballsy exercise in what Jim Shepard calls "the empathetic imagination." The close-third-person narrative on the Mexican couple is well-researched and multi-dimensional. It also struck me as slightly "off." Something about the characterization seemed more removed than Boyle's familiar group, the buffoonish whites. I don't know if Boyle would take the same risks in perspective in 2019 as he did when it was published in 1995. I don't know if he should, or shouldn't. I haven't decided on the morality of the point-of-view experiments in The Tortilla Curtain, but the uncomfortable overall narrative and themes haven't left me, either.