Fruit Of The Drunken Tree

 This story is set in Bogota, Columbia during the 1990's. At that time Pablo Escobar was a drug lord who kidnapped people and held them for ransom. In this story, two sisters named Chula and Cassandra, live with their parents. The mother hires a girl from a poor area of town. Her name is Petrona. In their yard is a tree that bears flowers and fruit. The girls are warned not to handle the flowers nor the fruit as they are poisonous. As the family adjusts to the escalating violence in the streets of Bogota they have to make a choice between sacrifice and betrayal. Some chapters of the book are violent. The author, Ingrid Rojas Contreras, was a child in Columbia in the 1990's. She says Fruit Of The Drunken Tree is based on the events of her life. The story is captivating and told in alternating chapters by Chula and Petrona.