Ghost House

by Ingrid Rojas Contreras

Short story, Fiction
"The stories of kidnapping always begin the same way."

Unbound

First published October 15, 2014

About the author

INGRID ROJAS CONTRERAS was born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia. Her memoir, The Man Who Could Move Clouds, was named a “Best Book of Summer” by TIME. Her first novel Fruit of the Drunken Tree was the silver medal winner in First Fiction from the California Book Awards, and a New York Times editor’s choice. Her essays and short stories have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, The Cut, and Zyzzyva, among others. She lives in California.

Reviews

[Barb H · Rating 3 out of 5]

The following sentence is viewed in the description of this story. "The stories of the kidnapped always begin the same way". Indeed, the harrowing tales of those abducted individuals are viewed immediately.

As this talented author stated, this outrage was much different. This is because there was also a massive manhunt taking place. Pablo Escobar, the notorious narco conspirator, had again escaped from prison. Secret tunnels had been found leading from hideouts to neighboring houses, meaning of course, that the people were conspiring to keep Escobar free. The reason was clear,he handed out stacks of money to the poor- a modern-day Robin Hood.

Meanwhile a family was suffering and tormented because the father had failed to return home. The story is related by a young daughter, whose fears were clearly heart-rending.

The author, Ingrid Contreras,was born in Bogota, so she knew first-hand of the problems of the kidnappings there. She is the recipient of many awards for her writing. Although the writing of this tale is clear and well described, the content was disturbing, so I was unable to rank this higher.