The activity of the "Arregladera" should not be confused with that of "La Celestina" (by Fernando de Rojas) or the Jewish matchmaker (“shadjaná”). She is neither a woman of ill repute and a mercenary with a mercantilist spirit like the former, nor is she part of close family connections like the latter. She is the one who resolves various problems and romantic issues in her community, without charging fees, although she receives gifts (similar to legal consultants in Ancient Rome). She is the regional solution for achieving peace in a medium-sized community, avoiding violence, in this case, in Valle de Bravo, State of Mexico. The "Arregladera" “fixes” open and furtive loves, deals with livestock, grains, lands, and ranches. She triangulates between the “needy,” who approach her discreetly, as in public she is known as a “sobadora,” because she soothes aching bones with special mastery because 'Clarita', the “Arregladera”, is blind. She lives hidden with her accumulated wealth ('centennials', famous gold coins). She holds personal bench in the town church. The community cannot live without her presence, but her activities are not a topic of open conversation. As a young woman, she lived with four extremely lazy brothers, due to a wrong decision made by their father.

By a strange twist of fate, the "Panadero Sabedor" holds the control and administration of both civil and ecclesiastical records, which are kept separately. The first is overseen by the government and the second by the Catholic Church. The "Panadero Sabedor" takes advantage of this to alter records, reducing the age of widows and older women, among other misdeeds, in exchange for money. The consequence is that public records give official status to lies, while the "Arregladera" knows the secret truths (like in the case of "help" to the infertile husband, who parades around boasting about impregnating his wife, unaware that the newborn is not his). The town becomes a hall of mirrors of crossed truths and lies, where the "official truth" is a lie, and the arrangements of the "Arregladera" are "secret truths." It is a picaresque plot of tales, falsehoods, and inventions, especially when the "Arregladera" and the "Panadero Sabedor" marry and join forces to squeeze the pockets of the residents, which reaches a peak when the beauty of the town, is disqualified in the Miss State of Mexico contest, for having been born in Monterrey (which is an official lie). The daughter of the wealthy local chieftain, a member of the ruling political party, wins instead. People become enraged and violence erupts. The “Panadero Sabedor” hangs strangled from one of the imposing ash trees surrounding the town's central square, after shouting to the people, the worst insult in the Spanish language.

The jury in Spain: this novel is clever and playful, ironic and surprising. It recues the picaresque novel.