Isabel Allende describes herself as a novelist, feminist, and philanthropist. She is one of the most widely-read authors in the world, having sold more than 75 million books. Chilean born in Peru, Allende won worldwide acclaim in 1982 with the publication of her first novel, The House of the Spirits, which began as a letter to her dying grandfather. Since then, she has authored more than twenty five bestselling and critically acclaimed books, including Daughter of Fortune, Island Beneath the Sea, Paula, The Japanese Lover, A Long Petal of the Sea, The Soul of a Woman and her latest novel, Violeta.
In 2014, President Barack Obama awarded Allende the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, and in 2018 she received the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters from the National Book Foundation. The Isabel Allende Foundation invests in the power of women and girls to secure reproductive rights, economic independence and freedom from violence.
