Allende's Eva Luna, which inspired her short story collection, The Stories of Eva Luna, was first published by Plaza & Janes Editores in 1998. The story, a good example of the Latin-American magical realism that Allende is known for, concerns the strange life of the title character, a woman who is conceived on her father's deathbed and nearly dies when she is strangled by the umbilical cord in her mother's womb.

Allende's Portrait in Sepia details the life of Aurora del Valle, a daughter in a wealthy and powerful family in Allende's native Chile. She becomes a photographer in order to capture, record, and attempt to untangle the complicated mysteries of her family and life. The author draws on characters from The House of the Spirits and Daughter of Fortune, two of her earlier novels. This book was published by HarperCollins in...