What black novel to buy on Book Day or Sant Jordi?
Juan Salvador López, bookseller of the Madrid store Studio in Scarletan excellent space specialized both in this genre and in science fiction and fantasy, proposes the following "proscribed readings" within a genre such as black in which there are "many more colors" and that has many possibilities, labels and styles: “It is a very extensive field with very diffuse limits, where the enigma, police, black novel, the thriller with all its ramifications come into play…”, he warns.
'The President', by Alicia Giménez Bartlett (Alfaguara)
A very well told police story, with touches of humor, harshness and compassion, inspired by real events.
It stars two young people who encounter all kinds of difficulties from the same bosses who have commissioned them to solve a murder.
'The two sides', by Teresa Cardona (Siruela)
Teresa Cardona sets The Two Sides in El Escorial (Madrid) and the investigation of a crime leads the inspectors to see many parallels with another crime committed twenty years ago, and to ask where the limits of morality, truth and justice are.
'The borrowed names', by Alexis Ravelo (Siruela)
Two retired people on an island, which is not in the Canary Islands, appear to have other lives outside their past, but a photo in a newspaper triggers a series of events.
Violence and action in a kind of contemporary western in the latest book by Canary Islander Alexis Ravelo.
'A Veiled Reflection in the Glass' by Helen McCloy
A classic mystery where a teacher is fired in the middle of the course because she claims to have seen something that is not possible, is she?
'She came in through the bathroom window.' by Elmer Mendoza (Alfaguara)
Drug traffickers and impossible loves intersect in Elmer Mendoza's She Entered through the Bathroom Window, which reflects much of today's Mexico.
"Under the Harsh Light" by Daniel Woodrell
Probably the best black novels, black novels, that are published right now are in the Sajalín publishing house, which has just translated Under the Hard Light (1986), by Daniel Woodrell, author of The Bones of Winter and, in the words of Dennis Lehane, "The least known of the great contemporary American writers."
'Alone at the Top', by Carlos Sisí
Carlos Sisí ventures into the thriller with Alone at the Top. “The man wakes up in the room of a house that he does not recognize. He doesn't remember anything: neither who he is, nor how he got there. He suddenly finds himself… ”, that is the start.
Night Through the Looking Glass by Fredric Brown (Kingdom of Cordelia)
The proscribed readings of Juan Escarlata begin with one of my favorite novels, so I am glad that there is a second edition with a new cover, in addition to enjoying reading and rereading it, it makes me happy to be the author of the four-page prologue, all my work, forgive the self-praise. Night Through the Looking Glass by Fredric Brown is published by Kingdom of Cordelia.
'Hills of Death', by Chris Offutt (Sakhalin)
Also in the Sajalín publishing house, Cerros de la muerte by Chris Offutt, where the protagonist will do everything possible to find the murderer before the victim's family takes justice into their own hands, something common in the region that usually spawns a prolonged spiral of violence and death.
The Other Sherlock Holmes (1892-1944) by Arthur Conan Doyle
And as we are followers of Sherlock Holmes, we really liked the anthology of eighteen stories "The Other Sherlocks Holmes (1892-1944)", selected by Pablo Muñoz, all of them, except one, published during the lifetime of Arthur Conan Doyle.
Elena Martinez Blanco, Serendipias bookstore, in Tres Cantos (Madrid), suggests the following works among those that are read and liked the most by the readers who come to his bookstore:
'As it was in the beginning', by Daniel Blanco (Algaida)
A very curious novel in which there is no murder but there is a mystery to solve: the protagonist receives a very valuable watch as a gift from her husband, she loses it, or so she thinks, the family makes her feel bad about it and 30 years later, the day he retires, the watch appears in perfect condition in an envelope on his desk. Her daughter investigates with a journalist in her closest environment to find out who is the person who has stolen it and what her mother did to be treated like that. A book that reflects very well the relationships between mother and daughter, and the rural settings in which what they say is so important.
'Talión', by Santiago Díaz (Planeta)
The protagonist is a journalist who is diagnosed with terminal cancer and decides to take revenge on the villains who are the protagonists of a report she is dealing with. She is faced with a moral dilemma in the police in the face of the death of these suspects, as she is unaware that the murderer is a woman. The book has an intense ending in which a possibility is raised that the murderess has to accept or not, so it keeps the reader on edge throughout the reading.
In The Good Father and The Other Girls, by the same author, the same police inspector appears who has to investigate two separate crimes. In The Good Father, a man fights against an unjust sentence that perhaps is not so unjust. In The other girls the plot deals with what happens to the murderer of the Alcasser case, as if he came back now after these years.
'The silver night', by Elia Barceló (Roca editorial)
A highly intriguing novel by an excellent narrator in which a police officer on leave of absence, specializing in child kidnappings and homicides, has to investigate the disappearance of a Spanish girl who loses track of a Christmas market in Vienna, in the summer of 1993. 27 years later, the police find a child skeleton in the garden of a house on the outskirts of the Austrian capital.
'Time of harvest', 'The virgin of the bones' and 'Dying in November', by Guillermo Galván
A trilogy built in the classic way, with a lot of weight from the researcher, set during the Franco regime. A wonderful reflection of the Madrid of the time.
To complete the 14 works proposed by these two bookstores comes a final recommendation from the editorial staff of elDiario.es:
'Crime', by Ferdinand von Schirach (Salamander)
A German writer and jurist who, in addition to this volume of stories from 2009, based on cases in which he participated as a defense attorney, we recommend Guilt (2010), also stories based on his judicial experience, and The Collini case (2011) , his first novel.
Become a member of elDiario.es and get a special pack with the five novels of the 'Episodes of an endless war' by Almudena Grandes: Inés and joy, Jules Verne's reader, Manolita's three weddings, Dr. García's patients and Frankenstein's mother.
