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I am delighted to announce the upcoming publication of Flowers for Chelo. Based on a true story, this book follows one woman's courageous journey from communist Cuba to freedom. I hope you'll enjoy Chelo's remarkable story.

#Biographical memoir #Cuba #Cuban Diaspora #Cuban exile #Cuban history #Flowers for Chelo #Louis Villalba #True story

« Veiller sur elle » de Jean-Baptiste Andrea

Un chef-d’œuvre, un éloge à l’amour et à l’infatigable force humaine qui pousse à chercher le vrai bonheur. Avec une prose glorieuse et poétique, l’auteur raconte une histoire d’art qui se déroule pendant la première moitié du XXe siècle en Italie. La puissance des rêves humains et des durs travaux survit à tous les types de difficultés et de périls. Inspiré par son amour impossible pour une…

Y SURGIÓ GADIR

Hace muchos meses que no escribo a mis lectores y amigos. Hoy lo hago para darles una buena noticia: la proxima publicación de Y surgió Gadir. En enero de 2025 —tres años después de la muerte de mi amigo Manolo Calero—, el azar quiso que encontrara, extraviado, su diario de una excavación en el corazón de Cádiz. De ahí nació este libro. En él, Calero da vida a los hallazgos que confirmaron la…

Fatalismo español/ José Cadalso

Primero en su idioma original. ¡Aquí va! Siempre pensé que el tan extendido fatalismo español provenía de la perdida del imperio de las Españas. Sus colonias llenaban los mapas de las Américas y se extendía en el Pacifico. En ese mundo hispano el sol nunca se ponía. No existía ni existió mayor imperio. Pero no, no era así. Mirad lo que escribió mi paisano José Cadalso en 1772, muchos años…

The Snow Child/Luis Mateo Díez

I’d love to share with my readers this beautiful story I came across in a book: The Snow Child In the village of Murada, where the northern edge of Celama touches the border, lived a young couple with a seven-year-old son. I won’t say the names of the mother or the father because in this story it isn’t necessary—nor the name of the son, as it will become clear later. It was not a day to go out…

An Eternal Present/ Patrick Modiano

I used to believe that their memory came to me like light from a star that died a thousand years ago, as a poet once said. But no. There was no past, no dead star, no light-years forever separating us from one another—only an eternal present. I have clear images of a Christmas Eve when the dancer took Pierre and me to Midnight Mass at the Saint-Ferdinand des Ternes church. She said it was our…

The time you have wasted/ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Here is my secret. It is very simple: one sees clearly only with the heart. What is essential is invisible to the eye.“What is essential is invisible to the eye,” the little prince repeated, so that he would remember.“It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.”“It is the time I have wasted for my rose…” said the little prince, so that he would remember.“Men…

Sunshine on the grass/ Émile Zola

Soon, Trompette lay sprawled on the cast-iron floor, motionless, like a heap. He still didn’t move, lost in the nightmare of that dark, endless hole, that deep room echoing with uproar. They were beginning to untie him when Bataille, unhitched a moment earlier, approached and stretched out his neck to sniff this companion who had fallen from the earth like this. The workers widened the circle,…

I knew all about death/ Jeroen Brouwers

Before I could read, I knew all about death. It was so much a part of my early years to be bluntly confronted with it that, as far as I knew, there was no emotion attached to it—no fear, no sorrow, no revulsion. A person who died would be rolled into a rush mat and taken away on a handcart. Her possessions, especially if they included a crumb or a grain of food, were fought over, and the place…

Carmela and Pepe

Some of my readers have received emails to let them know that my book Carmela and Pepe (the two versions: Spanish and English) was available for purchase. I published it last July 16, my mother’s Saint Day. I notified no one. It is such an extraordinary memoir! I left it adrift in the ocean of books to be discovered by chance. I wanted to surprise the readers with a beautiful story. I did not…

Miette and Silvère/ Emile Zola

THIS POST IS DEDICATED TO MY GRANDDAUGHTER ANDREA.

Silvère drew the water necessary for household chores in Aunt Dide’s. One day, the pulley split. The young wheelwright carved a beautiful, strong oak pulley, which he installed in the evening after his workday. He had to climb onto the wall. When he finished his work, he remained straddling the wall cap, resting and curiously observing the vast expanse of Jas-Meiffren. Pulling weeds a few steps…

Born Slaves

To celebrate Juneteenth, I am copying a note I wrote in my diary in July 2008. That day, I talked to a black gentleman at a meeting in the Park Hyatt Chicago: The 39-year-old PhD scientist was born in Lafayette, Louisiana. He had just come back from a trip to visit his family, the first time after Kathrina’s devastation. The whole area—which is 60 miles from the coast—was destroyed by seawater…

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Sufferings of Love/ Garcia Marquez

His instructions to the inspector and the intern were precise and rapid. There was no need for an autopsy; the odor in the house was sufficient proof that the cause of death had been the cyanide vapors activated in the tray by some photographic acid, and Jeremiah de Saint-Amour knew too much about those matters for it to have been an accident. When the inspector showed some hesitation, he cut him…

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“That man loves you.” / Andre Dubus, III.

“That man loves you.” Her eyes seemed to darken and she looked back out at whatever was beyond those screens. “Have you ever had it just stop, Noni?” “What? The feeling?” “Yes.” “The sex part or the other?” “The other.” “I did with your grandfather, but he killed it off himself.” “What about with Don?” “I didn’t like him sometimes, but I always loved him.” Susan seemed to go real…

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HUMANS NEED FRIENDSHIP/ Romain Gary

Men must preserve something other than what serves them to make soles or sewing machines. That they leave some margin, a reserve, where it would be possible for them to take refuge from time to time. Only then can we begin to speak of a civilization. A civilization solely utilitarian will always go all the way to forced labor camps. We need to leave some margin. And then, let me tell you. There’s…

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New Publications

Hello friends and readers, I have been so busy that it has been several weeks since I posted something on my blog. I finished the new book in Spanish, Carmela y Pepe. As you can see in the picture, I have not published it. The photo shows a book proof, which cannot be sold. As I explained before, when I received it and read the events in the story, with all the details of everything that parents…

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CARMELA Y PEPE

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2024

FOTO DE MIS PADRES CON MI HERMANA MARICARMEN Y YO. Note: Traducción en ingles después del español. Este libro narra la historia de dos jóvenes que formaron una pareja modesta a mediados del siglo pasado. Lucharon incansablemente para sobrevivir a los crueles años de la Guerra Civil Española, la penuria de la posguerra y la terrible melancolía e injusticia que azotaron a la sociedad española…

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