Floreana, historiadora joven, más bien retraída, llega a un albergue sui generis en la isla de Chiloé. Allí, en medio de los paisajes del sur profundo chileno, acuden mujeres diversas para curar las heridas de un dolor común: el desamor de los hombres.

Si bien la incapacidad afectiva masculina parece ser, para ellas, la clave del desencuentro, la autora da voz -por primera vez- a un punto de vista masculino: el médico del pueblo, un santiaguino autoexiliado en la isla, que arrastra sus propias heridas.

Ambivalentes, reprimidos en el sexo, vacilantes en el compromiso amoroso, los hombres sienten miedo frente a la autonomía que las mujeres han ganado. Mientras tanto, en ellas crece la insatisfacción, el «mal femenino de este fin de siglo.

ENGLISH DESCRIPTION

The Retreat for Heartbroken Women is an x-ray of love and heartbreak, a novel through which Marcela Serrano speaks for the women and men of today in search for more genuine and happier relationships.

Floreana, a rather withdrawn young historian, arrives at a unique hostel on the island of Chiloé. There, amid the landscapes of the Chilean deep south, diverse women come together to heal the wounds of a common pain: the heartbreak by men.

Although male emotional unavailability seems to be, for them, the key to not being able to find common ground, the author gives a voice -for the first time- to a male point of view: the town doctor, a self-exiled man from Santiago who lives on the island, and who also drags some of his own wounds.

Unsure, repressed in sex, hesitant to a loving commitment, men are afraid of the autonomy that women have gained. Meanwhile, dissatisfaction grows with women, which is the "feminine evil" of this new era that we live in.