Julie Heifetz

[As Far As the I Can See] is an account of the author’s year spent working at El Torbellino, a world class small resort carved out of the Mexican jungle near Cancun. The resort is owned by Julie’s longtime friend Molly and Molly’s husband Luis Felipe. As the story begins, Julie plans to move permanently to a house she has bought on the resort property, in hopes of recovering from the traumatic break-up of her marriage and of finding a more peaceful and fulfilled life in the exotic setting of the Mayan jungle. She has been hired at El Torbellino to help Molly in the sales department. But on the day after she arrives, Luis Felipe has a heart attack, and he leaves with Molly for Miami to seek medical treatment. As they leave, they ask Julie to look after the running of the hotel. Julie’s decision to agree to their request plunges her into a year of stressful, sometimes frightening, challenges as she takes on the management of the resort. Many staff members, especially Carla, Luis Felipe’s mistress, seem dedicated to making her task impossible. She also finds support among a few of the hotel staff members and especially from the Mayan couple who are caretakers for her house and who extend their care to Julie as well. Memorable, sometimes eccentric, characters, beautiful passages of description, suspenseful twists of the plot, and Julie’s journey to “seeing” more clearly into herself and her capabilities make this memoir compelling reading.… (lisätietoja)