Juan Preciado is the first protagonist introduced in Pedro Paramo. He travels to Comala for the first time and discovers that the thriving rural Mexican town of his mother’s youth has been replaced by a desolate ghost town. Soon, Juan learns, the desolation of the town was caused by his long-lost father, Pedro. He meets a half brother named Abundio, who gives him information of who to seek out in Comala.

In the opening chapters, Juan not only meets a long-lost family member but also discovers that his mission is more fraught than he ever imagined. Rather than the beautiful rural Mexican town of his mother’s memories, he finds a “sorry looking place” (2). Comala has been intentionally destroyed by the very man he has come to find. The town itself has become a metaphor for the corrosive effect of nostalgia, which deludes people into believing the past was better than the present. As the ghosts assure Juan, the past was a violent, terrible place. Comala becomes a reckoning for Juan, a place that reveals to him the hollowness of his mother’s happiness. The town was never a nice place, she merely glimpsed it through a nostalgic lens.