Former UN chief publishes debut novel at age 94

Lima: Peruvian diplomat and former UN secretary-general Javier Perez de Cuellar has launched his literary career at age 94 with the presentation in Lima of his first novel "Los Andagoya", the story of a family in the 1930s.

Philosopher Fernando Carvallo, who read several passages of the book at a presentation in Lima Tuesday, said the novel was "full of a sober irony".

Perez de Cuellar described his work as "a voyage from the diplomat to the writer" and said it asserts the "coexistence of two activities" he has carried out during his entire life.

"Los Andagoya", published by Spain's Alfaguara, of the Penguin Random House group, and the Peruvian Academy of Language, is set in Lima and the resorts of Barranco and Miraflores in the 1930s and tells the story of Clemencia, the eldest and only survivor of five children and matriarch of an illustrious and proud family.

This ideal situation changes when two alleged brothers of Clemencia appear on the scene and when her nephews Pascual and Eloisa, whose marriage she had arranged, suffer a crisis in their relationship.