The writer and journalist Berna González Harbor (Santander, 55 years old) has unanimously obtained the Dashiell Hammett Prize for the best black genre novel in Spanish published in 2019 for The Dream of Reason (Destination). Cristina Fallarás, winner in 2012 for The Lost Girls , was until now the only woman who had obtained it in 33 years of history of the main prize awarded by Black Week. “Gijón, which is a great festival, has many pending issues in this regard. I hope it will not take so many years to give it to a woman again, ”González Harbor told this newspaper as soon as he received the award. Among the finalists were Eugenio Fuentes or Domingo Villar.
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The work, the fourth installment in the series by Commissioner Ruiz, delves into Goya's world to tell a criminal plot that reflects the darkest of Spain before and now. "It is my blackest, most anti-system, most Goya-based novel, indebted to Goya and Goya was black, the great portraitist of a Spain that failed to Europeanise. The commissioner is out of the system and violates the protocols for the sake of a truth and justice that are no longer in the institutions, in the institutional police, but in the search for the same truth, "summarizes González Harbor.
In The Dream of Reason, a young art student fellow is found dead in a dam on the Manzanares River, a situation that gives rise to the author to take Ruiz - who is alone, without a weapon, without equipment - through a world of lights and shadows, from Goya to the underground tunnels of a little-known Madrid. The key to crime will be in the paintings, how we look at them and how their characters challenge us.
A journalist in EL PAÍS, González Harbor has always sought that his novels be glued to reality and that there be a clash of forces in them, essential for everything to take shape. “In this novel the main shock is that of Goya's Spain, the gentrified and colorful Spain of the Pradera de San Isidro, with that same place 35 years later when he draws horror, bestiality, black paintings. Goya's validity is that he painted Spain two centuries ago today. And this novel is the daughter of all this, of the clashes of a couple of years ago between independence and ultra-nationalism. Now, after the pandemic, we see that the Spain of hatred returns to take shape against the Spain of coexistence and that it is winning in many areas and that is extremely dangerous. Now science also faces ignorance, order against disorder ... ".
Now, after the pandemic, we see that the Spain of hate returns to take shape against the Spain of coexistence and that it is winning in many areas and that is extremely dangerous.
Madrid is an essential part of The Dream of Reason , a Madrid through which the crime novel has not traveled as much as could be expected. "We owe Madrid novels. Barcelona or Galicia already have Madrid, with what Madrid is, they lack it. It is a great fictional setting because it is a city where all these contrasts occur," summarizes the author of Verano en rojo. , (RBA, 2012), a novel that opened the series in a summery, scorching and footballing Madrid and that will be adapted to the cinema. The city that is seen in the novel is, on the one hand, that of the good neighborhoods, but also that of the squatters and that of the subsoil and, on the other, that of Goya's time. Imbricating these two realities and talking about art in a novel whose plot followed a rhythm typical of the genre has been the most complicated, confesses the author. "She did not want it to be an art treatise, she wanted it to be read by people who did not know about art, but she also wanted it to be a novel that young people could read," she summarizes to express her initial fears .
The life of a writer who combines her creative work with journalism is not characterized by loneliness as if she only dedicated herself to literature, but it was marked by an extra effort to balance everything. González Harbor is now working on a book "very much against show journalism", which she believes proliferates. Then, with renewed strength and a Dashiell Hammett under her arm, she will return to María Ruiz again. "I already have the atmospheres and the characters. I need to define the plot. And yes, it will be in Madrid."
The other awards
The rest of the prizes awarded by the Black Week have remained like this.
Celsius Award for the best fantasy, horror or science fiction novel in Spanish, for Nuestra parte de noche , by Mariana Enríquez (Anagrama). According to the jury, Enriquez's work, which has already won the Anagrama, "combines the best virtues of Gothic literature and horror with the narration of a murky moment in Argentine history."
Espartaco Prize for the best historical novel in Spanish for Mongo Blanco, by Carlos Bardem (Plaza Janés). "We have to be proud to bring beauty to people who are locked up," said the actor in a speech in which he stressed the need for culture in the times we live in.
Rodolfo Walsh Award for the best non-fiction work for El niño de Hollywood , by Óscar Martínez and Juan José Martínez (Destino).
Memorial Silvero Cañada Award for the best first novel for Sánchez , by Esther García Llovet (Anagrama).