AUTHORS
“
Startling... a concentrated power, akin to poetry
The New York Times
Sebastià Alzamora
SEBASTIÀ ALZAMORA (Llucmajor/Majorca, 1972) graduated from the Universitat de les Illes Balears with a degree in Romanic Philology. He was first known as a poet with a collection called Rafel, published in 1994 and dedicated to the memory of a friend. Since then, he has written five other volumes of poetry and eight novels, amongst them Sara i Jeremies (2002), Nit de l'ànima (2007), Miracle a Llucmajor (2010), Crim de sang (2012), Dos amics de vint anys (2013) and La Malcontenta (2015, theatrical adaptation in 2019). Fe is his most recent novel, to be published in 2020. He has been awarded several prizes for both his fiction and his poetry, including the prestigious Sant Jordi Prize for Catalan Literature in 2011 and the Serra d'Or Award of the Critics, in 2019. His works have been translated into Italian, English, Spanish, Danish, Polish, Portuguese and French. He writes a daily column for the newspapers Ara and Ara Balears.
Ràbia (Rage)
Fiction, novel, 100 pp
A masterful, terrifying take on the existencialist novel, the latest work by Sebastià Alzamora is about the rage our society feels, about a killing in the streets of Majorca and about the fate of the first person narrator's dog. Several adaptations and translations into other languages of Alzamora's novels are in progress.
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa), Croatia (Fraktura), Movie Rights (De Perris Films)
Reis del Món (Kings of the World)
Fiction, novel, 592 pp
A novel of ideas, Reis del Món centers around the lifelong friendship of a philosopher and a banker, both highly prestigious and important personalities in Spain throughout the 20th century. With both these characters coming from the same village on the island of Majorca, Alzamora offers a Nabokovian homage to the great writers of the past century. Originally written in Catalan, the translation counts with subsidies from the Institut Ramon Llull and the Institut d'Estudis Baleàrics.
Sebastià's writing has been hailed by the New York Times as "startling... a concentrated power, akin to poetry."
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa, Theatrical Adaptation Rights: Fundació Teatre Principal de Palma)
Dos amics de vint anys (Two Friends, at Twenty)
Fiction, novel, 210 pp
They just turned twenty and have a lot of things in common: they are brilliant and ambitious; they love arts and literature. They are insolent and feel the overexcitation of youth, they love cheating and laughing for hours, they admire each other and they have sailed together, the whole Mediterranian sea. They have shared and celebrated nearly everything, and it's even possible that they have fallen in love with the same girl. But it is 1938, at the peak of the Spanish Civil War, and - as Bartomeu lays dying from tuberculosis, Salvador is remembering their friendship... Based on the story of the Catalan writers Salvador Espriu and Bartomeu Rosselló-Pòrcel, this novel is a celebration of youth and friendship, but also a tale about the fragility of beauty, and about the longing and the joy of having known it.
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa)
Crim de sang (Blood Crime)
Fiction, novel, 278 pp
It is 1936, and Barcelona burns as the Spanish Civil War takes over. The city is reeking of blood, yet the nearly simultaneous murders of a Marist monk and a young boy even though seem strange enough to catch the attention of police inspector Gregori Muñoz. His quest for justice is complicated by politics, dangers and espionage. The Marist brotherhood is being investigated. In the meantime, a convent of Capuchine nuns hides in plain sight, trading favors with the military police in order to stay alive, and a thirteen-year-old novice stumbles into the clutches of her assassin. Can she escape, in this city of no happy endings? Told by a selfconscious vampire who thrives in the havoc of war, this stunning novel offers a quite gothic reflection on the nature of evil.
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa), US/UK (SoHo Press), France (Actes Sud), Italy (Marcos & Marcos), Denmark (Turbine), Poland (Marginesy), Film Rights (Bixagu Entertainment)
Miracle a Llucmajor (Miracle in Llucmajor)
Fiction, novel, 238 pp
Pere de Son Gall is a young peasant from Majorca who, in the early twentieth century, decides to build a flying machine. The project runs into all kind of trouble and provokes the mockery of the people in town who treat Pere as a fool and as a dreamer. But Pere is an obstinate man, both in his passion for flying and in his unconditional love for Maria Boscana, the daughter of a powerful landowner. In the meantime, a committee from the League of the Holy Word arrives from Barcelona, with the mission of fighting blasphemy and rudeness on the island. Miracle a Llucmajor is a celebration of the irresistible power of love and the ability for self-improvement of a man who always felt a passion, for flying.
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa), Italy (Marcos & Marcos)
La Malcontenta (The Unhappy Girl)
Fiction, novel, 237 pp
One winter morning in 1812, in Palma, the young Antònia Suau stares at the public execution of Joan Durí, the bandit who used to frighten the whole south of the island of Majorca. Antònia and Joan had defied together the misery of a savage, hostile region. Wounded by the death of her loving man and betrayed by a partner, Antònia —known as the “Unhappy Girl”— takes revenge in a men's world.
“The story of a pure love, unbeaten by time, beyond good and evil, beyond life and death” E. Sòria
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa)
Nit de l'ànima (Night of the Soul)
Fiction, novel, 271 pp
In an uncertain future, in a destroyed Barcelona, Faust is a young writer who lives a ridiculous nightmare. His penis and his testicles run away from his body, probably as a payment of a debt he has with Sibelius, his spooky publisher. Now, Faust will have to chase his noble parts, from south to north, in a Barcelona devastated by a mysterious phenomenon called the Waves. And he will have to have meetings with a lot of dangerous partners, in a suffocating night in which the presence of Sibelius is noticed all around. A grotesque, almost gogolian novel with a new interpretation of the myth of Faust, from a strictly contemporary point of view.
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa)
Sara i Jeremies (Sarah and Jeremiah)
Fiction, novel, 248 pp
Sarah and Jeremiah are a grandfather and a grandmother who, maybe for the last time in their lifes, host a lunch in which their huge family gathers. Twenty-five years ago, the same family met for the killing of the pig, one of the most traditional celebrations in the rural areas of the island of Majorca where the story takes place. But then there was another member of the family, a son of Sarah and Jeremiah, who disappeared. What happenend to him? In order to answer this question, we'll have to go back to the memory of Sarah and Jeremiah. And what we will get is a big story about love, friendship and loneliness, about vigour and old age, about serenity, loss and defeat, about fear and beauty. A story set in a world that has disappeared, the world of the island of Majorca before tourism came to take over everything.
— Sold to: Catalunya (Proa)