Nominated for the Man Booker International Prize For decades, Enric Marco was revered as a veteran of the Spanish Civil War, a crusader for justice, and a Holocaust survivor. But in May 2005, at the height of his renown, he was exposed as a fraud: Marco was never in a Nazi concentration camp. And perhaps the rest of his past was fabricated, too, a combination of his delusions of grandeur and his compulsive lying. In this hypnotic narrative, which combines fiction and nonfiction, detective story and war story, biography and autobiography, Javier Cercas sets out to unravel Marco’s enigma. With both profound compassion and lacerating honesty, Cercas probes one man’s gigantic lie to explore the deepest, most flawed parts of our humanity.

The Impostor: A True Story

Biographies & Memoirs

CERCAS,JAVIER

Historical

Vintage

From the internationally renowned author of The Impostor, a courageous journey into his own family history and that of a country collapsing from a fratricidal war--his most moving, most personal book, one he has spent his entire life preparing to write. Javier Cercas grew up hearing the legend of his adored great-uncle Manuel Mena, who died at nineteen in the bloodiest battle of the Spanish Civil War--while fighting for Franco's army. Who was this young man? A fascist hero whose memory is an embarrassment or a committed idealist who happened to fall on the wrong side of history? Is it possible to be a moral person defending an immoral cause? Through visits back to his parents' village in southern Spain, interviews with survivors, and research into the murkiest corners of the war, the author pieces together the life of this enigmatic figure and of an entire generation. This sui generis work combines intimate family history, investigative scholarship, personal confession, war stories, and road trips, finally becoming a transcendent portrait of a country's indelible scars--a book about heroism, death, the persistence of the past, and the meaning of an individual life against the tapestry of history.

Lord of All the Dead: A nonfiction novel

KNOPF

A deeply personal work of historical interrogation from the acclaimed author of Outlaws. Javier Cercas, “the bard of [the] movement for the recovery of Spain’s suppressed memory” (The New York Times Book Review), unpacks the legacy of the Spanish Civil War by way of his own family’s history.\nGrowing up, Cercas was inculcated with the legend of his beloved great-uncle, Manuel Mena, who died at nineteen in the bloodiest battle of the Spanish Civil War—while fighting for Franco. Who was this young man? A fascist hero whose memory is now an embarrassment or a committed idealist who happened to fall on the wrong side of history? In Lord of All the Dead, Cercas pieces together the life of his enigmatic relative and in so doing tells the story of an entire generation. Combining intimate family history, investigative scholarship, personal confession, and a novelist’s imagination, Cercas has crafted a transcendent portrait of a country’s indelible scars, a book about heroism, death, the persistence of the past, and the meaning of an individual life against the tapestry of history.

Lord of All the Dead: A Nonfiction Novel

Arts & Literature

Más de quince años después de la publicación de Soldados de Salamina, Javier Cercas regresa a la guerra civil española con una novela más íntima y personal, que indaga en el pasado más incómodo de su familia. Esta es la novela que Javier Cercas se había estado preparando para escribir desde que quiso ser novelista. O desde antes. En ella se narra la búsqueda del rastro perdido de un muchacho casi anónimo que peleó por una causa injusta y murió en el lado equivocado de la historia. Se llamaba Manuel Mena, y en 1936 se incorporó al ejército de Franco; murió en la batalla del Ebro, y durante décadas se convirtió en el héroe oficial de su familia. Era tío abuelo de Javier Cercas, quien siempre se negó a indagar en su historia, hasta que se sintió obligado a hacerlo. El resultado es una novela absorbente, pletórica de acción, de humor y de emoción, que nos enfrenta a los temas esenciales de la narrativa de Cercas: la naturaleza radiante y poliédrica del heroísmo, la terca pervivencia de los muertos o la carga del pasado más incómodo. Exploración local y universal, personal y colectiva, belicosamente antibelicista, El monarca de las sombras da una vuelta de tuerca a la pregunta sobre la herencia de la guerra que Cercas abrió años atrás con Soldados de Salamina.

El monarca de las sombras / Lord of All the Dead (Spanish Edition)

Vintage Espanol

Nueva edición de Soldados de Salamina, novela imprescindible del siglo XXI, revisada a fondo por el autor y rematada por un esclarecedor epílogo escrito por él mismo.\nA finales de enero de 1939, apenas dos meses antes del final de la guerra civil, un grupo de prisioneros franquistas es fusilado cerca la frontera francesa por soldados republicanos que huyen hacia el exilio. Entre esos prisioneros se halla Rafael Sánchez Mazas, fundador e ideólogo de la Falange, poeta y futuro ministro de Franco, quien consigue milagrosamente escapar y ocultarse en el bosque mientras los republicanos lo persiguen; hasta que un soldado lo descubre, lo encañona y, mirándolo a los ojos, le perdona la vida.\nSesenta años más tarde, un novelista fracasado descubre por azar este enterrado episodio bélico y, fascinado por él, emprende una investigación para aclarar sus circunstancias y desentrañar su significado. ¿Quién era de verdad Rafael Sánchez Mazas? ¿Cuál fue su verdadera peripecia de guerra? ¿Quién fue el soldado que le dejó escapar? ¿Y por qué lo hizo? ¿Qué secreto escondía su mirada? 
Novela revolucionaria y deslumbrante, Soldados de Salamina cosechó un extraordinario éxito de crítica y público y catapultó la carrera de uno de los novelistas más prestigiosos de la actual narrativa española. Desde entonces no ha dejado de leerse en todo el mundo con creciente admiración.\nENGLISH DESCRIPTION\nThis new edition of Soldiers of Salamis, a fundamental novel of the 21st century, has been thoroughly revised by the author and finished off by an enlightening epilogue written by the author himself.\nAn award-winning, wholly original and absorbing work of fiction by a modern master, at whose heart lies an investigation into the nature of historical truth.\nIn the final moments of the Spanish Civil War, fifty prominent Nationalist prisoners face a firing squad. Among them is Rafael Sánchez Mazas-writer, fascist, and founder of the Spanish Falange. As the machine guns begin to fire, Sánchez Mazas escapes into the forest. When a militiaman discovers his hiding place, Sánchez Mazas faces death for the second time that day. But the unknown soldier simply turns and walks away. Sánchez Mazas becomes a national hero and ultimately a minister in Franco's first government. The soldier disappears into history.\nSixty years later, as Cercas sifts through the evidence to establish what really happened, he realizes that the true hero may not be the one who was celebrated, but, rather, the soldier who chose not to shoot. Who was he? Why did he spare Sánchez Mazas? Every answer Cercas uncovers leads to another question in this powerful and elegantly constructed novel about truth, memory, and war.

Soldados de Salamina / Soldiers of Salamis (Spanish Edition)

Literature & Fiction

Genre Fiction

INTERNATIONAL BEST SELLER • WINNER OF SPAIN’S BIGGEST LITERARY PRIZE • Barcelona detective Melchor Marín is sent to the countryside to investigate a horrific double murder. Before long, it becomes clear that nothing about the case is quite as it seems in this “sweeping romantic novel in the form of a police procedural” (Wall Street Journal).\nThe first book in the internationally acclaimed series: Melchor, the son of a prostitute, went to prison as a teenager, convicted of working for a Colombian drug cartel. Behind bars, he read a book that changed his life: Les Misérables. Then his mother was murdered. He decided to become a cop.\nThis new case, in Terra Alta, a remote region of rural Catalonia—the murder of a wealthy local man and his wife—will turn Melchor’s life upside down yet again.\nEven the Darkest Night is a thought-provoking, elegantly constructed thriller about justice, revenge, and, above all, the struggles of a righteous man trying to find his place in a corrupt world.

Even the Darkest Night: A Terra Alta Novel

United States

In the final moments of the Spanish Civil War, fifty prominent Nationalist prisoners are executed by firing squad. Among them is the writer and fascist Rafael Sanchez Mazas. As the guns fire, he escapes into the forest, and can hear a search party and their dogs hunting him down. The branches move and he finds himself looking into the eyes of a militiaman, and faces death for the second time that day. But the unknown soldier simply turns and walks away. Sanchez Mazas becomes a national hero and the soldier disappears into history. As Cercas sifts the evidence to establish what happened, he realises that the true hero may not be Sanchez Mazas at all, but the soldier who chose not to shoot him. Who was he? Why did he spare him? And might he still be alive?

Soldiers of Salamis

Contemporary

Bloomsbury Paperbacks

The Tenant and the Motive are two darkly humorous novellas from the award-winning author of Soldiers of Salamis. Written with the lightest of touches and layered with sardonic wit, they are masterpieces of understatement that linger long in the memory. The Tenent is a mischievous take on the American campus novel, delivering Kafkaesque twists on a theme of academic rivalry and backstabbing. Out jogging one day visiting linguistics professor, Mario Rota, twists his ankle and from then on his life starts to unravel. A rival professor appears at the university, takes over his classes and bewitches his girlfriend. Where will Rota's nightmare end? More important, where did it begin? The Motive is a perfectly judged satire about a writer who takes literature much more seriously than he does life. Alvaro becomes obsessed with finding the ideal inspiration for his novel. First he begins spying on his neighbours, then he starts leading them on. The result is a reversal of the usual maxim that art follows life, with dire consequences for those around him, not least himself.

The Motive and the Tenant

Bloomsbury UK

The Impostor (MacLehose Press Editions)

MacLehose Press

The Impostor

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