decent peoplelast installment of the black series of Leonardo Padura is one of the novels published in Spanish that stood out during 2022, according to a summary made by the Spanish agency efe.
The work of the author from Havana, winner of the Princess of Asturias Award in 2015, shares with Violetby Isabel Allende; Everything is going to get better, the posthumous work of Almudena Grande, and other books such as Revolutionby Arturo Pérez-Reverte.
With decent people (Tusquets), the Cuban returned to bookstores with the ninth crime novel, “the most detective and Havanan of the series starring the policeman Mario Conde,” the Spanish agency points out.
In this book, he addresses the context of 2016, a time in which, as its protagonist points out, an “illusion” was experienced in Cuba, the dream of an opening materialized with the visit of US President Barack Obama.
Violet, by Isabel Allende (Plaza y Janés), was the first of the great literary releases in Spanish of 2022 and one of the best sellers of the year. It addresses the story of a woman whose life encompasses the most relevant historical moments of the 20th century, from 1920 -with the so-called “Spanish flu” to the 2020 pandemic.
Everything is going to get betterby Almudena Grandes (Tusquets), is a posthumous novel by the Spanish writer, who died in November 2021.
It is a political dystopia set in a future Spain in which the new Movimiento Ciudadano Soluciones Now! sweeps the elections, led in the shadows by a successful businessman, and in which the situation that is generated after the “ Great Blackout”.
Padura in the Borges room: “It is not fair that we live with more fear than our share”
While, Revolutionby Arturo Pérez-Reverte (Alfaguara), is an adventure story in Mexico in the times of Emiliano Zapata and Francisco Villa, a story about “a man, three women, a revolution and a treasure”, and an initiation novel, learning of a young man who through violence and observation reaches maturity.
Other titles of the year highlighted by Efe:
except my heart everything is fineby Héctor Abad Faciolince (Alfaguara): In this book, the Colombian writer explores the vision of marriage through the story of a kind priest -inspired by a real priest- who puts his beliefs and unwavering optimism to the test in a hostile world .
Rome is meby Santiago Posteguillo (Ediciones B): The most important author of historical novels in Spanish, with four million readers, began this year with “Roma I am”, a saga of six novels about Julius Caesar, which will last for more than one decade, dedicated to telling the story of this character who changed history.
Far from Louisianaby Luz Gabás (Planeta): Published in November, the winner of the last Planeta award recounts the adventure of Spain in the heart of North America through the four decades in which it possessed the lands of Louisiana in the 18th century, a work by the Spanish author who debuted in the historical genre with the bestseller “Palm trees in the snow.”
cauteryby Lucía Lijtmaer (Anagrama): The Argentine writer deals with the escape from pain as a way of survival and the rebellion against gender roles through a seventeenth-century English woman who leaves England to go to the colonies, and another contemporary who travels from Barcelona to Madrid after being abandoned by her partner.
the polish loverby Elena Poniatowska (Seix Barral): The 90-year-old Mexican author and Cervantes Prize winner wrote this novel to learn about the history of her own family through Stanislaw Poniatowski, the last king of Poland in the 18th century.
ash in the mouth by Brenda Navarro (Sexto Piso): Two years after her successful “Empty Houses”, the Mexican writer talks in this novel about emigration, uprooting, the permanent feeling of being a foreigner and, by extension, about exploitation, job insecurity or racism.
