FINAL SALE, NO EXCHANGE, NO RETURNS
In Mesmo rio, Elisama Santos starts from the idea that, just as “no one can step into the same river twice”, it is impossible to be the same mother to all of one’s children. And this invariably leaves deep marks on everyone. It is an invitation to enter the rushing waters and the not-so-obvious twists and turns of this intense course that is family dynamics. With the support of an engaging literary narrative, the author entangles us with captivating and real characters in everyday situations, which gradually lead us to complex feelings.
Here, we follow the story of the Soares family: the mother, Maria Lúcia; the father, Benedito; and the three children: Lucas, Marília and Rita. Throughout her life, the mother established a specific relationship with each child. She is devoted to one and impatient with the other. She loves one of them without reservations, while the other feels he needs to give up his feelings in order to be accepted. The consequences of this are gradually revealed, like a cup that is gradually filled, drop by drop, day after day, throughout life, until it overflows.
Since she was little, Rita, the youngest in the family, sought from her mother the love that was easily offered to her siblings. The impossibility of finding it leads her, apparently unexpectedly, to close the gate of her house and never return. Although her siblings believe that it was a drastic act – after all, the mother they had did not deserve that –, Rita's break with the mother she knew happened slowly. So slowly that Lucas and Marília did not realize it, like the rust that corrodes the strongest of structures and the erosion that the river causes on its banks.
So, during a family Christmas, the relationship between Rita and her mother finally falls apart, and the rubble spreads. Will there be room for reconstruction? Is there anything left to make it possible for the two to meet again and establish a real connection?
More than answers, in this moving – and, at times, disconcerting – novel, Elisama Santos makes us access our own history and work through our questions.
