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Lo venden como un bolso lujoso, pero huele sospechosamente a plástico.

Lo venden como un bolso lujoso, pero huele sospechosamente a plástico.
They sell it as a luxurious bag, but it smells suspiciously like plastic.
From Lesson 487:Extreme degree by repetition·Spanish (Latin America)

Questions & Answers about Lo venden como un bolso lujoso, pero huele sospechosamente a plástico.

How can I apply this lesson's topic (reduplication) to emphasize that it smells like undeniable, 100% cheap plastic?
You can repeat the noun to emphasize its prototypical qualities. Instead of just saying huele a plástico, you could say huele a plástico plástico. In conversational Latin American Spanish, repeating a noun like this implies maximum degree, meaning it smells like the absolute epitome of plastic.
Why is it huele a plástico instead of just huele plástico?
In Spanish, when you want to say that something smells like or tastes like a specific noun, you must use the preposition a. So, oler a means to smell like, and saber a means to taste like. Without the a, it would sound grammatically broken.
The translation says 'They sell it', but could lo venden also mean 'It is sold'?
Yes! Using the third-person plural (venden) without a specific subject is a common way to express impersonal statements in Spanish, much like the English generic 'they'. It functions very similarly to the passive voice or the impersonal se (se vende), conveying that it is sold by unspecified people.
Is there a reason sospechosamente comes before a plástico? Could I put it at the end of the sentence?
Adverbs generally go immediately after the verb they modify, which is why huele sospechosamente sounds the most natural here. You could technically put it at the end (huele a plástico sospechosamente), but it sounds a bit clunky. Keeping the adverb right next to huele flows much better.
Why is the adjective lujoso placed after bolso here? Could it go before?
Placing lujoso after the noun bolso is the standard, objective way to categorize the bag. If you placed it before (un lujoso bolso), it would sound more poetic, subjective, or like an advertisement. Since the speaker is cynically contrasting the luxury claim with the cheap smell, the standard after-noun placement works perfectly.

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