The latest addition to my website is Luis Felipe Fabre‘s Declaración de las canciones oscuras (Recital of the Dark Verses). Saint John of the Cross/San Juan de la Cruz was a sixteenth century mystic and was revered by many but not well liked by the religious authorities because of his piety and asceticism. He had … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Antonio Soler‘s El nombre que ahora digo (Soldiers in the Fog). The novel is set in the Spanish Civil War and follows the story of Gustavo Sintora. He had fled, like many others, from his hometown of Malaga, as Franco approached and after a few adventures ends up … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Belén Gopegui‘s Quédate este día y esta noche conmigo ( Stay This Day And Night With Me). This is a novel about Google. We start with a Google intern receiving a non-standard job application. It is 50, 000 words, on paper, not submitted digitally and submitted by two … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Almudena Sánchez‘ s Fármaco (Pharmakon). This is about Almudena Sánchez’s struggle with depression, which hit her in her early thirties. Unlike other novels/memoirs on depression, this is not a realist account of the depression. Rather it is a writer writing about her depression rather than a depressive giving … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Enrique Vila-Matas‘Montevideo. Our unnamed narrator has written one novel while living in Melilla, turned to drug dealing in Paris and goes back to his writing career in Barcelona before setting off on his travels, particularly to Montevideo, where he explores a hotel, which was the subject of stories … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Manuel Astur‘s San: el libro de los milagros (Of Saints and Miracles). Marcelino, a naive young man living in Asturias, a remote rural part of Spain, is cheated out of his farm by his conniving brother (who takes after their drunken, violent father). He kills his brother and … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Javier Cercas‘Terra Alta (Even the Darkest Night). Cercas has now turned to crime novels – two more in this series have been published in Spanish. We are following a Spanish police officer – Melchor Marín – who had been a drug dealer for which he was sent to … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Almudena Grandes‘ El corazón helado (The Frozen Heart). This is a long and complicated novel set mainly in the present but very much looking back to the Spanish Civil War. We follow the stories of two related families, one primarily Francoist and one primarily Republican, and their respective … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Juli Zeh‘s Neujahr (New Year). Henning is on holiday in Lanzarote with his wife, Theresa, and young children. On New Year’s Day 2018 he decides to go cycling on his own up the steep slope to Mount Atalaya. During his ride he thinks of his life, which is … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Javier Serena‘s Últimas palabras en la Tierra (Last Words on Earth). This is a fictionalised account of a novelist called Ricardo Funes who is based on the great Chilean novelist, Roberto Bolaño. We follow his struggles, firstly in Mexico and his involvement with what is called here negativism … Read more