The Book of Chameleons

I would have never guessed that this week I’d end up reading a book that’s narrated by a gecko. But I will say it didn’t disappoint.

The Book of Chameleons engaged me within the first pages. The descriptions and imagery were intricate and beautiful. I think I would love to live in Félix’s house from what is described. I absolutely love that there is an avocado and papaya trees in the backyard and the descriptions of the garden and library sound so nice.

Félix’s job is to sell pasts to people in the form of forging documents and crafting family trees. This type of service is reserved for the upper class, the bourgeoisie. This concept is so creative and fascinating to me. I never really thought about how your past can or can’t give you some type of power and prestige. Having a well known, noble and culturally significant name can do a lot for success. I think this proves that family heritage and your past helps people go far just as much as your current achievements. I think having a prestigious name makes people trustworthy and also protected from the law especially if the person’s occupation is illegal.

The part that confused me was the purpose of having a reincarnated gecko as the narrator. I thought it was unique but I can’t seen to grasp the deeper meaning of that choice. Maybe there isn’t supposed to be a deeper meaning and it’s just to add some playfulness. What I did think had a purpose was how the gecko’s human life has some intricacy to it. He talks about how he wish he would have found love and how he wish he had a better childhood. I thought this was kind of reflection and regret of past life similar was to the story of The Shrouded Woman where Ana María reflected on her life as she was in a somewhat of a purgatory.

An interesting theme in this book was reality and dreams. Multiple chapters were about the dreams of the gecko who is the narrator. A lot of them were reflections of the human life that the gecko used to have. Some of them made me a bit sad because they showed that the life he used to have wasn’t all that fulfilling. The first one he talks about how no one noticed or talked to him when he was human. There seemed to be blur between dreams and reality in this novel. “My dreams are almost always more lifelike than reality” (p. 46). This blur between reality and dreamlike state reminded me of a lot Proust. Even Félix argues that his line of work isn’t about forging but it’s about creating dreams for people.

“I don’t do things like that. I invent
dreams for people, I’m not a forger” (p. 17).

Question: My question for discussion is how do you interpret the quote stated above? Do you think this is really true about Félix’s work?