num_pages: 224
description: Four women—two girlfriends, the sister and mother—all dote on Juan Carlos, self-styled ladies' man, who's dying of tuberculosis in the small Argentine town of Vallejos. His mother beseeches, his sister stands guard, both women (the "good" and the "loose") betray him. All bemoan his cruel destiny and fail to see their own lives eroding beneath them. Material for an installment romance in a magazine of the forties: loosing his ironic wit upon a clichéd genre and his spotlight on a small-time tragedy, Manuel Puig has fashioned an affecting and near-perfect work of art. "Puig is moth a funny writer and a tenderly elegiac one" (Newsweek).
language: English
title: Heartbreak Tango
titlecomplete: Heartbreak Tango
genres: Fiction, Spanish Literature, Latin American, School, Romance, Latin American Literature, Classics, Novels, Literature, 20th Century
ratings_count: 6012
publisher: Plume