Reviewed by Monique Prince, Undergraduate Services Librarian
Bel Canto opens with a lavish birthday celebration honoring Japanese businessman Mr. Hosokawa, whose sole reason for visiting this unnamed South American country is to hear the world-famous soprano, Roxane Coss. During the festivities, armed terrorists break into the Vice President's home, where the party is taking place. Their plan to kidnap the President is thwarted when they discover he is not in attendance, and instead, they hold the partygoers captive. The next day, several men and all women (except Roxane Coss) are released, and the captors and hostages settle into their new routines. The hostages are from all over the world, and have only Mr. Hosokawa's translator to assist them in communicating. As days stretch into weeks and weeks stretch into months, the captors and prisoners form strong bonds with each other and with the music that comes to dominate their existence. Life in the house becomes idyllic for many of its inhabitants, and preferable to the world outside the walls surrounding the mansion. Patchett's inspiration for Bel Canto was a 1996 hostage crisis in Lima, Peru, which lasted for more than four months and was said to include soccer games, chess matches between captors and hostages, and pizza delivery. Bel Canto won the Orange Prize for Fiction and was a P.E.N./Faulkner nominee.
