April red or the forms and consequences of violence

Abstract

The article analyzes the novel April red, by Santiago Roncagliolo, published in 2006. This text, operating from the strategies of the noir novel, reflects on the consequences that derive from the memory of the actions of the Shining Path in the Peru of the 2000s. To do this, he follows the actions of a District Attorney from the province of Ayacucho who is investigating a violent crime. However, this investigation will end up revealing details that go beyond that crime: how the memory of the violence does not disappear, but returns disturbed; how violence intoxicates everyone, even those who seek to neutralize it; and how that violence generates a devastating effect: the disqualification of the utopian.