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THE TREASURE OF DIOGENES SANCHEZ by James Munves

THE TREASURE OF DIOGENES SANCHEZ

By

Pub Date: April 9th, 1979
Publisher: Four Winds

Any book that begins ""A small boy, fourteen years old,"" has a lot to account for (he's not undersized); and this one goes on, no more promisingly, to present Andean native Diogenes with the problem of saving his faithful old horse The Frog from being sold by the dastardly uncle who's taken over after Diogenes' father's death. But the author wants, however clumsily and crudely, to say something: in running Diogenes through one after another gritty, disillusioning experience (a wheedling charcoal-burner makes off with The Frog, the uncle repents and then proves untrustworthy, a bleeding-heart benefactor treats Diogenes contemptuously) he leads the boy to the conclusion that plain old spunk--or standing up for oneself--is the ""treasure"" of the title. But the socially-illuminating incidents remain indigestible lumps in a thin broth.