Isabel Allende, a Chilean American novelist/memoirist now residing in San Rafael, California, merges feminist political-social commentary with family sagas, myth, and personal history. Born in Lima, Perum in 1942, she says her mother Francisca is her greatest supporter. The caption of a photo of her mother and herself, viewable in Allende's current online album, reads: “My mother is the longest love affair of my life. We have never cut the umbilical cord.” Letters to her mother form the basis of the memoir The Sum of Our Days (2008), and she frequently visits her in Chile. Earlier, while working for the United Nations in Santiago, Isabel married Miguel Frías. In 1963 she gave birth to her daughter Paula, and in 1966 to her son Nicolás. One of her first publications was Grandmother Panchita, a story she told her own children. In 1973 the assassination of her cousin Salvador Allende sent her into exile in Venezuela. When she got word her grandfather was dying, she began a letter for him…