"A book for someone who likes...": recommendations that readers have asked 'Babelia'

What book to give to someone who loves history?

What about a 16-year-old boy who is crazy about sports, but doesn't usually read?

One for those looking for surprising endings?

Or for a mom who is taking up reading again?

About psychology, but not naif?

A novel for someone who misses Almudena Grandes a lot?

The list of the best books of the year is extensive —you can consult it here—, but it does not offer proposals for everyone.

For this reason, we have reopened the office of journalist and

critic Javier Rodríguez Marcos so that, based on the clues provided, he can propose titles that, hopefully, will delight readers.

The query, launched from the EL PAÍS accounts on Instagram and TikTok, received a hundred questions on all topics, although it is noted that fans of history books and crime novels abound among readers.

Rodríguez Marcos has responded to many of them, trying to group them by genres and affinities, with a sense of humor and, above all, with the desire that those who receive the precious gift of a book enjoy it.

• "He Likes Unexpected Surprises":

  The End of the Affair

  , by Graham Greene.

  Total “unexpected” surprise.

• "Very, very reading adolescent":

  The body in which I was born

  , by Guadalupe Nettel.

  Very well written and perfect for someone looking for her place in the world, teenager or not.

• "True Stories Having to Do with Nature":

  A Year in the Woods

  , by Sue Hubbell.

  Real as life itself.

  That of the protagonists, who believed that another world is possible and went to live in it.

  They also believed in this phrase from Thoreau that will ring a bell: “I went to the woods because I wanted to live consciously and discard the false.

  In order not to realize, at the moment of dying, that I had not lived”.

• "Black Novel":

  Burnt Silver

  , by Ricardo Piglia.

  I confess, I have a weakness for this book.

  And for the quote from Brecht that opens it (and almost explains it): "What is robbing a bank compared to founding it?".

• "Classic Black Novel":

  The Moonstone

  , by Wilkie Collins.

  I may have gone too classic, but I must confess that its "but" impressed me.

  The moonstone is a diamond, by the way.

  And damn, they say.

  Also by the way.

• "Autofiction":

  The event

  , the masterpiece of Annie Ernaux, the last Nobel laureate and teacher of autofiction.

  She, who is reddish, calls it an auto-socio-biography, but she is not scared.

  Yes, the book is hard.

  But masterful.

• “For those who miss Almudena Grandes a lot”:

  Tea Rooms

  , by Luisa Carnés, an author that Almudena liked a lot.

• "He Loves History":

  The Cheese and the Worms

  , by Carlo Ginzburg.

  A fundamental title of microhistory applied to the Middle Ages.

  Part of the file of the Inquisition to a miller for getting into the reader.

  He eye then.

• "Science Fiction, but Updated":

  Exhalation,

  by Ted Chiang.

  The science fiction book that all the Borgesians in the world (including me) read after finishing

  The Story of Your Life

  , which inspired the movie

  The Arrival

  .

  Call me a fetishist.

• “A 9-year-old boy, he plays paddle tennis and soccer.

  He likes dragons and nature and he prefers the graphic novel”:

  And Then We Got Lost

  , by Ryan Andrews.

  I imagine he has a bicycle.

  If not, give him one and this graphic novel.

  Classic adventure, friendship, nature.

  What times.

• "Psychology, not naive":

  The strangest people in the world

  , by Joseph Henrich.

  It answers the big question of whether genes or education condition us more.

  Minimal spoiler

  : you are among the weirdest people in the world.

  Why?

  Because think of a book as a gift.

• “He likes poetry and reading women”:

  Poesía masculina

  , by Luna Miguel (the title is ironic, don't be scared) or

  Ararat

  , by Louise Glück, the Nobel laureate.

  Two great books of clear but not flat poetry.

  Mothers, daughters, sons, couples and two very different generations.

  If you don't feel like reading poetry (sometimes it happens):

  Cauterio

  , by Lucía Lijtmaer, one of the great novels of 2022.

• “He wants to learn to write”:

  Hebe Uhart's classes

  , by Liliana Villanueva.

  Adjectives, metaphors, monologues, characters, vices and virtues of writing... everything is in this 150-page booklet.

  Practical and deep.

• “He likes Philip Roth.

  He likes death, beauty, madness... ”:

  Does he really like death?

  So

  Herzog

  , by Saul Bellow, Roth's teacher (because I assume he's already read

  The Dying Animal

  , by Roth himself).

  If he likes life,

  Country Girls

  , by Edna O'Brien, his favorite author's favorite writer.

• “Boy, 16 years old, obsessed with calisthenics, has had a hard time picking up a book ever since.

  What do you recommend?”:

  Olímpicas

  , by Juan Antonio González Iglesias (you can read a poem between exercises).

  Or, if he's scared of poetry (though there's no reason),

  Alison Bechdel's

  The Secret of Superhuman Strength .

  A graphic novel about someone obsessed with exercise.

  We agreed that he was 16 years old and had a sense of humor, right?

• "He loves history books":

  Slavery in Spain

  , by José Antonio Piqueras.

  A little-known episode that could be summed up in one sentence, yes, a long one: a good part of Spanish economic progress in the 19th century (and what followed) was due to the African slave trade to America and its atrocious exploitation.

  Well yes, we were slavers.

• “Mom of two children, she loves to cook and is taking up reading again.

  In search of favorite book”:

  Dear Miguel

  , by Natalia Ginzburg.

  A wonderful mother-child epistolary novel.

  If you prefer something more “luminous” (with mother in the background),

  Earn a Life

  , by David Trueba.

  In fact, it is the book that I would recommend to everyone who has asked for advice this year.

  It has 64 pages and does not reach 10 euros.

  It is subtitled

  A Celebration

  and it is.

  Absolute wonder.

  Another

  urbi et orbi

  I recommend is

  Water and Soap

  , by Marta D. Riezu.

  Another marvel, this time in fragments.

  It also contains the exciting portrait of a mother.

• "Her Favorite Writer Is Herman Hesse":

  A Razor's Edge

  , by W. Somerset Maugham.

  Between the historical

  novel

  and the spiritual (with a great war in between).

• “Graphic novel on social or political issues.

  Thank you very much, Javier”:

  Grass

  , by Keum Suk Gendry-Kim.

  Social, political and historical.

  And terrifying, literally.

  About Korean women (sex slaves of Japanese soldiers) during World War II.

• "Erotic Novel":

  Five Corners

  , by Mario Vargas Llosa.

  It may not be the best book by his author, but Vargas Llosa is incapable of writing badly.

  You asked for eroticism and there you have it.

  And the good stuff, and many more things:

  thrillers

  , crappy journalism, politics... All very exciting, you see.

• "Stories from the Second World War":

  Hiroshima

  , by John Hersey, or

  On the Natural History of Destruction

  , by WG Sebald.

  Two visions of the war from the point of view of the defeated: Japan and Germany.

  To complete the

  photo

  beyond the version of the winners, who also caused their havoc but tell little about it.

• “He really likes Stephen King-style horror books”:

  The House at the End of Needless Street

  , by Catriona Ward.

  A woman is looking for her missing sister and… I stop here.

  Stephen King said on Twitter that he was the best of the 21st century and even non-fans of the genre dedicated part of it to him last summer.

  Yes, by day.

• “She likes stories about immigration, resilience, friendships and family”:

  Disengaged

  , by Margaryta Yakovenko.

  It has the four things you ask for.

  Also, you will learn a lot about Ukraine.

  And about Murcia.

• "Youth Fantasy and Science Fiction Classics":

  The Dispossessed

  , a metaphor for inequality and injustice on Earth but outside of Earth and without sacrificing the story to any metaphor.

  For many, it is the masterpiece of its author, Ursula K. Le Guin, a teacher of the genre.

  My imagination is a bit stunted, but she fascinated me.

• "He likes nature, travel, politics with humor":

  Dear children

  , by David Trueba.

  Humour, politics and travel (although by bus, all over Spain, with a candidate for Prime Minister in an electoral campaign).

  You burst out laughing… until you no longer like so much cynicism.

  Then the good part begins.

• "He likes black novels and traveling":

  Decent People

  , by Leonardo Padura.

  The new work of the Cuban author and creator of Mario Conde (the detective, not the banker).

  I started it attracted by the

  Padura brand

  and by the plot (it leaves on Obama's trip to Havana) and I didn't stop until the end.

• "Black Novel":

  Those Women

  , by Ivy Pochoda.

  "A book to stamp on the heads of those who take their aesthetic prejudices against the genre for a walk," says the great expert in crime novels from EL PAÍS, Juan Carlos Galindo.

  I believe him.

  Also when he says that the author is a master synthesizing "sobriety, complex characters that make them uncomfortable and stories that mark the reader."

  I'm going to request it for Reyes (along with the time I'll need to read it; I'll ask my bosses for that).

• "He Likes Wuthering Heights":

  The Picture of Dorian Gray

  , by Oscar Wilde.

  Ingenuity and bad vibes in equal parts.

  Eternal youth for the tremendous.

  Like in our days.

• "He is interested in deep America":

  The Liars Club

  , by Mary Karr.

  The life of a smart girl surrounded by deep Americans who know how to use both a bottle and a gun, as appropriate.

  A first-person masterpiece.

• “Dan Brown-type story”:

  Foucalt's Pendulum

  , by Umberto Eco. It has something of

  The Da Vinci Code

  but much earlier and much better.

  Templars, Paris, science, technology... At times, it's also scary.

• "He loves paddle tennis and surfing, father of two children and he liked

  Open

  ":

  Wild Years

  , by William Finnegan.

  He won the Pulitzer.

  You end it wanting to get on a board (then they pass, of course).

• "Latin American Literature":

  The Twilight Zone

  , by Nona Fernández.

  A true story in Pinochet's Chile with the rhythm of a spy novel by John le Carré and the personal point of Emmanuel Carrère.

  If you think I'm exaggerating, we'll talk after you've read it.

  I pay for the coffee.

  And I show them the newspaper.

  You and the purpose of your gift.

• "Sociology and Philosophy":

  Against equal opportunities

  , by César Rendueles.

  A brilliant essay on the false myth of meritocracy.

  Any book by Rendueles would do.

  Few like him combine clarity, humor and rigor.

  And one of priceless tablets (aphorisms):

  Caminos de intemperie

  , by Ramón Andrés.

• "Her Favorite Writer Is Cormac McCarthy":

  Any collection of short stories by Flannery O'Connor.

  You can start with

  The Artificial Negro

  or

  The Good Country People

  .

• "Science":

  A universe from nothing.

  Origin without a Creator

  , by Lawrence Kraus.

  I read that this book is to physics what

  The Origin of Species

  is to biology and I bought it.

  And I read it.

  And I understood it.

  I believe.

  I even wrote a summer article in this newspaper entitled "Two billion Augusts."

  They are the ones that are missing so that the expansion of the universe makes it impossible to observe.

  Of course, the sun will go extinct before: in 5,000 million years.

  Take advantage of the beach.

• "Ancient Rome":

  The World in Late Antiquity

  , by Peter Brown.

  To understand why ancient Rome came to an end and to discover that the barbarian invasions are more like the current waves of migration from the south than a strategy organized from the north by one Attila.

• "Psychology and magical realism":

  You shine in the dark

  , by the Bolivian author Liliana Colanzi.

  A book of stories in which the magic can be a nuclear power plant or the relationships in a family.

  Call it psychological realism or magical psychology.

  It is great literature.

• “I like nature, I like to learn by reading.

  I love the intellectual”:

  Ideas for an Impure Imagination

  , by Jorge Wagensberg, who was wise and funny.

  The perfect essay for someone who wants to learn and who says that he loves "intellectual things", that is, that he has a retardation, right?

  (Note: the book is much better than the title).

• “Lives of Kings and Queens.

  Lately she has read one by Victoria, the wife of Alfonso XIII and she loved it”:

  Isabel II

  , by Isabel Burdiel.

  So that she knows the grandmother of Alfonso XIII and the origin of several of our current "peculiarities".

  It was awarded the National History Award and it could have been for Narrative because it is wonderfully written.

• “He's a chef, he loves outdoor cooking and horror stories”:

  Hannibal

  , by Thomas Harris.

  It's a novel, but it works as a cookbook for meat recipes… human.

• "The Spanish Civil War":

  What to do with a dirty past, by José Álvarez Junco.

  Perfect mix of story and essay.

  The title says it all, right?

• "Travelling, especially in Asia and India":

  India

  , from the Nobel VS Naipaul, whom one would read whatever he wrote.

  If you already know it, one by Patrick French with the same title,

  India

  .

  This time recommended by our expert in that country, Jesús Aguado (that I went with Naipaul by other paths).

• "She is interested in communism, the drama of the exiles and the cold war":

  The Communist's Daughter

  , by Aroa Moreno Durán.

  Something more than a Spanish communist novel in post-war Berlin.

  A little known episode.

  If you prefer non-fiction: the memoirs of Jorge Semprún (aka Federico Sánchez).

• "Their writers are Borges and Javier Marías":

  Written Lives

  , by Javier Marías.

  A set of portraits of great writers from little things, be it a routine walk or a bathrobe.

• "Historical novel":

  El entenado

  , by Juan José Saer.

  This novel is historical in every way: because of its theme and because it is a canonical work of 20th century literature.

  A Spanish sailor and conquistador falls into the hands of cannibals from the Río de la Plata and lives with them waiting for them to eat him.

  He adds suspense to his many virtues.

• “Historical fiction or psychological suspense”:

  Cold Skin

  , by Albert Sánchez Piñol.

  "We are never infinitely far from those we hate."

  Behind that first sentence is an island you never want to go to.

  From the book, however, you do not want to leave.

  With the permission of

  El entenado

  , the word suspense was invented for such a story, also masterfully told.

• “I would like to give myself a book now that my birthday is coming up.

  I have always read literature, but I have lost the habit”:

  The Adversary

  , by Emmanuel Carrère.

  Read the first page.

  If with this he does not recover the taste for reading, it is that he has lost it very much.

  We can find another.

  Congratulations, by the way.

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