[1] The plotline was inspired by journalistic accounts taken from magazines, newspapers, and interviews that Allende herself gathered both working as a journalist in Chile before her exile and during her later career as a writer in Venezuela.

[2] Irene is a magazine editor living under the shadow of the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile.

As a sympathizer with the underground resistance movement, Francisco opens her eyes and her heart to the atrocities being committed by the state.

Irene and Francisco begin a passionate affair, ready to risk everything for the sake of justice and truth.

[3] In 1994, this novel was adapted into a film starring Antonio Banderas and Jennifer Connelly.