They had two children, a son and a daughter. While living in Chile, Allende finished her secondary studies and met engineering student Miguel Frías whom she married in 1962. In 1970, Salvador Allende appointed Huidobro as ambassador to Argentina. In her youth, she read widely, particularly the works of William Shakespeare. The family returned to Chile in 1958, where Allende was also briefly home-schooled. In La Paz, Bolivia, Allende attended an American private school and in Beirut, Lebanon, she attended an English private school. Huidobro was a diplomat appointed to Bolivia and Beirut.

In 1953 Allende's mother married Ramón Huidobro and the family moved often. In 1945, after Tomás left them, Isabel's mother relocated with her three children to Santiago, Chile, where they lived until 1953. Her father was a first cousin of Salvador Allende, President of Chile from 1970 to 1973.

Fluent in English, Allende was granted United States citizenship in 1993, having lived in California since 1989, first with her American husband (from whom she is now divorced).Īllende was born in Lima, Peru, the daughter of Francisca Llona Barros called 'Doña Panchita' (the daughter of Agustín Llona Cuevas and Isabel Barros Moreira, of Portuguese descent) and Tomás Allende, who was at the time a second secretary at the Chilean embassy. Īllende's novels are often based upon her personal experience and historical events and pay homage to the lives of women, while weaving together elements of myth and realism.

President Barack Obama awarded her the 2014 Presidential Medal of Freedom. Allende has been called 'the world's most widely read Spanish-language author.' In 2004, Allende was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and in 2010, she received Chile's National Literature Prize. Allende, whose works sometimes contain aspects of the genre magical realism, is known for novels such as The House of the Spirits ( La casa de los espíritus, 1982) and City of the Beasts ( La ciudad de las bestias, 2002), which have been commercially successful. Isabel Angélica Allende Llona ( American Spanish: ( listen) born in Lima, 2 August 1942) is a Chilean writer.

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