the breakout novel from the award-winning Colombian author of Leopard In the Sun. Full of wit and intelligence, tragedy and compassion, the Dark Bride takes us deep into the Colombian jungle to a magical world of glittering lights, dangerous liaisons and illicit pleasures.Sayonara is a young and beautiful Indian girl. She is also a puta, a prostitute, who lives and works in the remote village of tora. Once a month oil-riggers from the US-owned tropical Oil Company descend on tora, where Sayonara’s allure is legendary and no one is immune to her charms. She rules the squalid paradise like a queen, until one day - against the sage advice of her ‘Godmother’ - she violates the unwritten laws of her profession and falls in love with a man she can never hope to have. Her unrequited passion burns within her, until, unable to quench her desire, she pursues her dream - the consequences of which are devastating, not only for herself, but for the entire village.