Amores que matan (Murderous Love)

Fiction, novel, Mediterranean Noir, 374 pp

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The second in the Santa Rita Series, a Mediterranean Noir, this is for the likes of Inspector Colombo. The inhabitants of Santa Rita, with their problems and stories, and two corpses - one, a child’s skeleton that has just been found in the remains of a collapsed wall in the old part of Santa Rita, next to some very valuable paintings by the expressionist school “Der Blaue Reiter”, the other the body of a well-known art historian who had to have the paintings appraised - form the narrative core of this novel with nods to suspense classics such as Colombo or Dexter.

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—  Sold to: Spain (Roca)

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Muerte en Santa Rita (Death in Santa Rita)

Fiction, novel, Mediterranean Noir, 374 pp

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The first in the Santa Rita Series by Elia Barceló, a Mediterranean Noir, this is for the likes of Agatha Christie. A whodunnit that starts off with the corpse of a senior in the lavish gardens of Santa Rita, a multi-generational house run by an elderly lady who is providing shelter for all kinds of people.

—  Sold to: Spain (Roca Editorial), Italy (Elliot)

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La noche de plata (Silver Night)

Fiction, novel, Crime, 392 pp

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A mystery situated in a world full of everyday situations yet never trivial, with a strong and authentic female protagonist, as is Barceló's trademark. "La noche de plata" is full of suspense and thrill, a fascinating and dark ride, set in Austria, yet travelling through time and space.

—  Sold to: Spain (Roca Editorial), Italy (Elliot)

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El eco de la piel (The Echo of Skin)

Fiction, novel, 542 pp

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Ofelia Arráez founded an international fashion empire the size of Zara’s. Sandra, who is in her late twenties, is chosen to write her biography. These are the two protagonists of Elia Barceló’s new novel. Ofelia, who had been born in 1918, has recently passed away. Ofelia’s husband died under mysterious circumstances in 1955. But Ofelia went on with their business, with the help of her handmaid. In 1941 she gave birth to her only son, Luis, who now, in 2016, hires Sandra to tell Ofelia’s „true“ story. But how can we know it is true? What does Sandra find out and what does Luis want to hear? Masterfully, Elia Barceló guides us through a plot full of twists and turns, unexpected revelations, murder and love affairs.

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—  Sold to: Spain (Roca Editorial), Catalunya (Roca Editorial), Italy (Elliot)

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El efecto Frankenstein (The Frankenstein Effect)

Fiction, novel, Young Adults, 14 +, 331 pp
 

Nora is an emancipated young woman, studying and living on her own, with both her parents abroad. Max is from another, altogether different world where courtly rules apply and science is looking for new ways to understand the phenomenon of live and humanity. Max is from the eighteenth century, Nora is a girl from the twentyfirst. They meet when Max visits Nora’s world through a time door and have to separate when Max goes back to 1783. But Nora decides to follow him into his universe and their story attracts us into an atmospheric and wonderfully built world where women had few rights and men a lot of obligations. We see „Frankenstein“ as a romantic gothic for a young readership, adding ironical twists to an unconventional lovestory that keeps the reader intrigued to the very last page.
 

— Sold to: Spain (Edebé), Catalan (Edebé)

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El síndrome Frankenstein (The Frankenstein Syndrome)

Fiction, novel, Young Adults, 14 +, 319 pp
 

In the fast-paced world of the 21st century, highly technological and transfigured by capitalism, Max and Nora will have to fight against all those who, regardless of the means, want to get hold of Frankenstein’s secret formula that will grant them eternal life. In different countries, and not knowing whom to trust, they will have to rethink what a monster really is and will be immersed in a race against time to have a future together.

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— Sold to: Spain (Edebé), Catalan (Edebé)

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El color del silencio (The Color of Silence)

Fiction, novel, 358 pp

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Helena Guerrero is an internationally acclaimed artist, well known for the shadows that invade her pictures and apparently reflect some mysterious never explained episodes of her past. Now, after many years abroad, three things conspire to bring her back to Madrid from Adelaide, Australia, where she currently lives: a hint she discovers during a psychological “constellation” therapy, a wedding in her family and an email from her estranged brother-in-law, offering to disclose some unknown facts regarding the murder of her sister Alice, in 1969. Together with her partner, Carlos, Helena will go looking for answers to the terrible questions that have troubled her all her life. She travels to Rabat, Morocco, to the old family manor, La Mora, with its mysterious gardens that have so long safely kept the shadows of the past.

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—  Sold to: Spain (Roca Editorial), Catalunya (Roca Editorial), Germany (Piper), Netherlands (Querido), Poland (Wydawnictwo Literackie), Croatia (Fraktura), Italy (Elliot)

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Las largas sombras (The Long Shadows)

Fiction, novel, 379 pp

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Ruth Rendell meets Pedro Almodóvar in Elia Barceló's latest novel where a crime in the past and a suicide in the present will alter the lives of a small circle of modern emancipated women who once were friends - and accomplices. The story centers around a filmmaker in her early fifties who is returning back to Spain in order to meet her best friend, Lena. Lena has asked Rita to come and see her. But when Rita, the filmmaker, shows up in her friend's apartment, Lena is already dead, leaving a note that points straight to the past, a past that Rita knows as well as nobody else in this story. But now the police is investigating and this will affect Rita and her old pals’ lifes so they gather and try to avoid the unavoidable: the detection of the lies they have all built their lives upon.

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— Sold to: Spain (Roca), Catalunya (Roca Editorial), Germany (Piper), Netherlands (Querido), Norway (Gyldendal), Italy (Elliot)

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Disfraces terribles (Terrible Disguises)

Fiction, novel, 446 pp

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A fascinating novel about unconditional love, misunderstandings and criminal power, based on the ficticious life of the prestigious Argentine writer Raúl de la Torre. In order to write his biography, the young French philologist Ariel Lenormand has to deal with several mysteries in the author’s life and gets personally involved when he falls in love with De la Torre’s first wife Amelia. A highly literary novel with an amazing field of characters and events, leaving the reader with a climax of solved suspense.

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— Sold to: Spain (Roca), Catalunya (Roca Editorial), Germany (Piper), Netherlands (Querido), Norway (Gyldendal)

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El secreto del orfebre (The Goldsmith's Secret)

Fiction, novel, 121 pp

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"The Goldsmith's Secret" is a small novel about love and the passing of time, about the unanswered question if we always fall in love with the same person and if this person really exists. It surely stands the comparison with Alessandro Baricco and is nearly impossible to resume without revealing its secret. Any current definition of time and space seems to become invalid and the reader will keep "The Goldsmith's Secret" in mind forever.

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— Sold to: Spain (Roca), Catalunya (Roca Editorial), Germany (Piper), UK (Maclehose), Sweden (Bonniers), Norway (Gyldendal), Denmark (Borgen), France (Flammarion), Italy (Marcos i Marcos), Croatia (Fraktura), Portugal (Palavra), Greece (Patakis), Czech Republic (Paseka)

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El vuelo del Hipogrifo (The Hippogriff's Flight)

Fiction, novel, 448 pp

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"The Hippogriff's flight" is a fusion novel. Entertaining, with elements of a crime novel and fantasy fiction, it manages to connect the different threads of the intrigue: The young philologist Katia Steiner is involved in a mysterious story after having started investigating the documents of Professor Valcárcel's estate. The appearance of a fortuneteller with supernatural abilities disturbs Katia's work and leads her into a seducing and dangerous adventure.

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— Sold to: Germany (Piper), Netherlands (Querido)

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Corazón de Tango (Tango at Heart)

Fiction, novel, 182 pp

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Dancing tango is a unique experience. Once forbidden, the eroticism of this dance has caused murder and separation, scandal and joy, throughout the twentieth century. Tango at Heart takes us back to the very roots of it, to the heart of darkness...  In 1920, Buenos Aires is a melting pot for people from all over the world. Natalia is from a Spanish family. She is to be married to a seafarer of German origin, Berstein the Red. But Natalia loves dancing and, while her freshly wed husband disappears in a sea-storm, she falls in love with one of her dancing partners. She has no money and starts to work as a dancer in the local brothels. Trying to escape this embarrassing situation and convinced by a bohème painter, she poses for a picture with her partner. Her husband, who survived the naval desaster, discovers this picture on his return and takes it as a proof of infidelity. With facts as obvious as this, murder is right around the corner... but the souls of both dancers survive and convince a couple of modern dancers to visit the places where the tragedy took place more than eighty years ago. For all those who have already appreciated Elia Barceló's wonderful and genre-skipping writing, Tango at Heart will be the culmination of their reading experience. For those who haven't yet, it shall be a perfect start.

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— Sold to: Spain (451 Editores), Germany (Piper), Netherlands (Querido), UK (Maclehose), Italy (Voland)

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Anima Mundi (Trilogy), Hijos del Clan Rojo (Children of the Red Clan) / Hijos de Atlantis (Children of Atlantis) / Hijos de las estrellas (Children of the Stars)

Thriller/YA, 512/522/480 pp

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For hundreds of years, the Children of the Clans have been living amongst us, barely noticed: Genetic mutations of the evolution line of the humans. They call themselves karah. Karah consider themselves superior and call human beings haito. They use them and they despise them. But now, slowly, they are dying out. So a few of them decide to use a human to give birth to what they call a “nexus”, able to open the door to another reality, their original reality, and to enable their own salvation. But in their arrogance, through the centuries they have forgotten how to establish contact with their own creators - and now they need to collect the widely spread information, from karah as well as from haito. And they go hunting for it... For eighteen-year-old Lena and her friend Clara this fact will change everything. While Clara rushes headlong into a dangerous love affair with a karah, Lena gets kidnapped by Sombra, a foggy creature that serves the clans and shall prepare Lena for an obscure task in the future. The young women and the people around them will find themselves involved in a complex and dangerous plot full of mysteries that will take Lena on a wild trip around the world. She will have to confront evil beings and constant threat. She will experience love and friendship, betrayal and death. She will find answers to fundamental questions and, finally, discover herself. But will she be able to save the world?

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— Sold to: Spain (Destino Juvenil), Catalunya (Planeta), Netherlands (Querido)

 

 

Mi vida por la tuya (My Life for yours)

YA, 123 pp

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Ted and Lessa are two young musicians who fall in love with each other. It could be the perfect beginning of a perfect love story. Save for the fact that their creators, two gods, wanted to cultivate them as perfect beings and to keep them on their own. So, their falling in love with each other was certainly not a part of the plan. And now the gods will do everything in their power in order to tear them apart. A modern version of the classical opera Alceste by Christoph Willibald Gluck.

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— Sold to: Spain (Edebé), Germany (Piper)

 

 

Cordeluna (Moonheart)

YA, 346 pp

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Along with other students from all over the country, Gloria has been chosen to act in a medieval theatre project. To rehearse in an authentic atmosphere, the young actors spend the summer in an ancient monastery on the countryside. Once there, Gloria nearly instantly falls in love with Sergio. But Barbara, one of the organizers, is also interested in him and tries to disturb their beginning relationship. Soon Gloria and Sergio, as well as some other participants, suffer nightmares and start to behave strangely. During their stay they become convinced of being possessed by some characters' spirits who lived a thousand years ago. Six young actors, each one in his role, will have to break a millenarian curse that condemned the love between Sancho, the Cid's vassal, and Guiomar, daughter of the Earl of Peñalba. With ficticious elements Barceló creates a mysterious connection between two intriguing love stories separated by ten centuries.

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— Sold to: Spain (Edebé), Catalan (Edebé), Valenciano (Marjal), Netherlands (Querido), Brasil (Biruta)

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El almacen de las palabras terribles (The Warehouse of the Terrible Words)

YA, 120 pp

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Twelve-year-old Talia's life suffers a sudden change when she runs into a mysterious old man who convinces her to enter the warehouse of the terrible words. In this place, Talia will have the opportunity to learn how to use the language in a good way since there have been situations in which the bad use of words has brought her into trouble, especially with her mother. Inside the warehouse, Talia meets Pablo who is a few years elder and visits this fantastic place for similar reasons. While Talia and Pablo remain in the warehouse, their parents and friends go through a sorrowful waiting because, for them, Talia and Pablo are in coma after a serious accident. When both of them return, a new life full of hope starts.

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— Sold to: Spain (Edelvives), Russia (Kompass)

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