The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende is an enthralling novel following the lives of Clara del Valle and her family as well as Esteban Trueba. Allende’s epic follows the lives of the Del Valle family from the time that Clara is born and through the rest of her life. A peculiar child, Clara shows signs of being an otherworldly individual throughout her life, and these aspects of her being go on to transform both her life and the lives of her family members as well as Esteban Trueba, a man to be engaged to her older sister, in various ways as time goes on. I really enjoyed reading this novel as Allende’s descriptions of its magical realism aspects as well as her ability to create such complex characters made it hard not to find it intriguing. Although I found the book very enjoyable, at times it was a little hard to keep reading because of how dense the content is, as the novel follows the story of the Del Valles and Esteban Trueba for decades. As a result, I would highly recommend this book to someone who is looking for a novel with a lot of diversity, and by that I mean a novel that has tons of different aspects to it and will constantly keep you reading closely.