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My Name is Emilia del Valle

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My Name is Emilia del Valle

By: Isabel Allende, Frances Riddle - translator
Narrated by: Coral Peña, Johnathan McClain
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About this listen

Bloomsbury presents My Name is Emilia del Valle by Isabel Allende, read by Coral Peña and Johnathan McClain

'A spellbinding masterpiece' SANTA MONTEFIORE
'Isabel Allende is a literary treasure' KRISTIN HANNAH
'A captivating novel of love and war from one of our most revered storytellers' KATE MORTON

The historical novel from literary legend Isabel Allende

Emilia del Valle was always destined for great things.

Abandoned at birth by her Chilean aristocrat father, Emilia comes of age in nineteenth-century San Francisco as an independent and fiercely ambitious young woman, decades ahead of her time. She will do whatever it takes to pursue her life’s passion for writing, even if it means publishing under a man’s name.

When Emilia lands a position as a journalist for the Daily Examiner, her unwavering sense of adventure – and new-found determination to survive in her own name – leads her to seize the chance to cover a brewing civil war in Chile alongside another talented reporter.

But the assignment offers Emilia more than just an opportunity to prove herself as a writer. Before long she embarks on a treacherous, life-changing journey in a homeland she never knew, to uncover the truth about her father – and herself.

A masterclass in historical storytelling from Isabel Allende, My Name is Emilia del Valle is a powerful tale of love and war, discovery and redemption, told by a valiant young woman who confronts monumental challenges, survives and reinvents herself along the way.

©2025 Isabel Allende (P)2025 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Historical Fiction War Emotionally Gripping Latin American
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Phenomenal - it held me engrossed and left me in tears. A history and a live story.

A brilliant book

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Beyond like and dislike - hard to listen to in parts- overwhelming but I needed to carry on listening

The story It gets right inside you

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Isabel Allende is a skilled storyteller and is good at worldbuilding. These and the historical detail carry the story and persuaded me to stick with the story to the end. The use of first person point of view was marred several times by the character becoming omniscient and telling the story from several other people's points of view. This made the main character less credible and less likeable. I felt the author wanted to tell readers everything about the period and forced the story to achieve this, making it and the main character less credible.

interesting historical detail, strong female character

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Another beautiful story from Isabel Allende; a history lesson and a lesson in love, strength and restless spirits

History, love and a restless spirits

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The length of the political detail and the journalists’ story were two different genres that did not blend well into one book. Either would have stood alone better than they stood together.

The final section of the journey to the south

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