Getting Lost On Purpose
A Review of Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli
Reading this novel by Valeria Luiselli felt confusing at first, but in a way that actually kept me engaged rather than pushing me away. The fragmented structure made it hard to follow a clear, linear storyline, but I started to realize that this disjointedness is kind of the point. Instead of telling a clean narrative, the novel moves through scattered thoughts, shifting perspectives, and moments that feel more like memories than events. That structure made me pay more attention, because I wasn’t just reading for “what happens next,” but trying to understand how everything connects.
What I found interesting is how this fragmentation reflects the narrator’s inner world. The constant switching between timelines, places, and even identities makes it feel like we’re inside her mind rather than outside observing a story. It’s messy, but intentionally so. Luiselli seems to be showing that memory and identity don’t work in straight lines—they overlap, repeat, and blur together. In that sense, the confusion isn’t a flaw, it’s part of the experience the novel is trying to create.
I also liked how the idea of ghosts is introduced so subtly. At first, it’s not even clear if anything supernatural is happening. The “ghosts” feel more like presences—people who linger through memory, writing, or imagination. As the novel continues, that line between real and unreal becomes even less stable. This made me think about how people can “haunt” each other without literally being ghosts, especially through stories and recollection. The narrator’s connection to other figures in the novel, particularly through writing and translation, adds to this sense that identities can overlap and bleed into one another.
One idea that stood out to me is how the novel almost wants the reader to feel lost. Instead of guiding us clearly, it leaves gaps and forces us to sit in uncertainty. This reflects larger themes of displacement and fluid identity, especially in the way the story moves between Mexico City and New York. The narrator is never fully grounded in one place, and that instability carries into the structure of the novel itself.
Overall, even though I didn’t follow every detail, I appreciated how the novel challenges traditional storytelling. Its fragmented form, subtle use of ghosts, and emphasis on memory over plot made it feel less like a story being told and more like a mind unfolding on the page. All this being said, it definitely wasn’t my favourite book we’ve read in class so far.
My question is, are the ‘ghosts’ in the novel actually supernatural, or are they just memories that refuse to leave?
I think that the ghosts could be a combination of both, but I'd lean towards them as spiritual presences reaching across spacetime. To me, the ghosts seem like the most transient, in-between figure: not alive but not dead either. Similar to the narrator's perspective in A Shrouded Woman. The ghosts are showing their historical presence to connect the parallel narratives. And the train station seems like the best place to have it appear. Train stations are symbols of transit, perpetual motion, and lines connected to each other, but also synonymous with gigantic crowds and seas of people. I think we've all had the moment where we think we've seen someone familiar in a crowd but we lose sight, or it turns out to be someone else; in this novel, this "someone" just happens to be the target of obssession, and a past and possibly fictional creation that they're never met for real.
Xavier
“the “ghosts” feel more like presences—people who linger through memory, writing, or imagination. As the novel continues, that line between real and unreal becomes even less stable. This made me think about how people can “haunt” each other without literally being ghosts, especially through stories and recollection”
Yes! Those presences are present beyond the limit of time or space.
See you tomorrow!
Julián.