Alejandro's Zambra's The Private Life of Trees starts simple: A professor, Julián is reading a story about a man who obsesses over bonsai to his daughter, Daniela. As this short book progresses, we find out that the daughter is actually Julián's step daughter and that their mother, Veronica has not returned home.

The Private Life of Trees then traces Julián and Veronica's lives until their destinies meet and also tells us what will happen in the future, who Daniela marries and what will happen to Julián and Veronica. Thus this is a book where past, present and future are all jumbled up.

Yet it's all done in a lucid and realistic way. As this is a book about the complexity of relationships and how destiny plays a part in that.

This is a playful, engaging novel, which has a meta element as Alejandro's debut book is called Bonsai (reviewed tomorrow) which details the story Julián is reading to Daniela.