Los Sobrevivientes

by Bryan Carl Kandel

This 7,000 word Spanish novel tells the true story of Flight 571, which crashed in the Andes mountains between Argentina and Chile in 1972. Left for dead, facing chilling cold and with nothing to eat, the passengers needed a miracle to survive. This compelling story provides great exposure to the Spanish language for students and native speakers.

Genres: Nonfiction, Read For School, Spanish Literature

72 pages, Paperback

Published September 25, 2017

Reviews

[dal · Rating 5 out of 5]

rating a book i read in spanish 5 stars was not on my 2024 bingo card
i think the reason i liked this book so much is that the main character wasn't a young Hispanic kid who hates their family. all the other books we have read are like that, but this one wasn't.
this was a survival story about real people and also canabalisam. it was a really good book tho lol. i could tell the roberto was the doctor from the beginning of the book lmao

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this for class and it was actually really good. I was able to read it quickly and understand everything very well. Even though there were some heavy topics, meaning new vocabulary, I didn’t struggle much.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Level B1

Very interesting story. A tiny bit slow in the middle but much better than most books for learners.

Not a big issue, but it also suffers a problem very common with this type of book: the words they choose to define in the footnotes don't always make sense. Some very easy words such as "barato" and "cómodo" are translated but harder words such as "cordillera"are not. And then "bajar" and "subir" are repeated multiple times for some reason.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

A 5 star rating for a book written at the intermediate level in Spanish.. I remember reading Alive by Piers Paul Read some 50 year ago (great book still available on Amazon in multiple formats). So this 55 page book won't go into the same detail but is still an interesting read for those of us looking to improve our Spanish by reading. This work comes from a company marketing to, I think, to schools and teachers. While it indicates it is for level 3 Spanish learners if you are at the B1 level (intermediate) I think you find this an enjoyable read for adults as well as high school students. The chapters are short focusing on dialog between the main characters. Even though there are digital links for some of the vocabulary, I believe you will understand most of them based on context.

[☆ ᴀᴠᴇʀʏ ☆ · Rating 5 out of 5]

me gusta lo mucho!!!!

[trains]

really interesting quick read! The pictures were very nice! Although I don’t think I can really rate this book idk



Did this story inspire the hit tv show Yellowjackets….

[Christina Despain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Me fascinó este libro. Se lo recomiendo a mis estudiantes. Es mejor que sea para los estudiantes de nivel 3 o 4 porque la gramática es compleja. El tema del canibalismo siempre les fascina a los seres humanos. Bryan Kandel es súper creativo y con este tema del canibalismo nos llega y nos toca algo muy poderoso dentro de cada persona, la parte que es un animal y que trata de sobrevivir cueste lo que cueste. No pudiéramos saber como nos portaríamos sin estar en una situación grave como les ocurrió en los Andes en el libro. Me gustaría pensar que yo nunca comiera a otra persona pero alguien realmente nunca se sabe hasta que llegue el momento de desesperación. ¡Gracias por escribir un libro tan fascinante, Bryan Kandel!
De hecho, un estudiante mío recién me dijo mientras estaba leyéndolo,
-Señora, este es el primer libro que he leído en clase con lo cuál no me di cuenta de que estaba leyendo para aprender español. (-Y. M., en la séptima hora)
¡He tenido este estudiante súper brillante en clase por 2.5 años! Así que él ha leído un montón de libros de este género y sabe la diferencia que yo noté también entre éste y la mayoría de este tipo de libros. ¡Necesitamos más así!
Bryan, quien es maestro de español en Ohio y un autor brillante, debe sentirse muy orgulloso, pienso yo.