Bruno Blog

How many times in life we use expressions where the moon is the protagonist. You’re on the moon! I love you until the moon and back! They are lunatic people!
I love full moon nights, that magical energy makes me feel good, and I would spend hours watching the moon reflected in the sea.  I don’t know if we can all visit the moon sometime, but from down here it already accompanies me. Although after reading the novel by Francesc Miralles, LA BIBLIOTECA DE LA LUNA (The library of the moon), I am hopeful to visit the moon someday. And with more reason if paper books are kept there: I would not hesitate to ask for a sofa and be able to read as much as I please those books that always stay on the bedside table for lack of time.

Francesc’s novel has everything: a bit of love, a bit of science fiction. It’s a magical novel, like the author, where his worlds are always created for the well-being of others, so that you feel good doing what you decide.

In a near future, Kumar, an eccentric tycoon, creates the first human colony on the Moon: Exovillage, a resort for big fortunes. Verne, who works as an online tarot player on Earth, looks at the night sky with growing despair: her soulmate and eternal platonic love, Moira, has been hired as a communications engineer at Exovillage.
The young man will get a job up there, although it has nothing to do with what he had dreamt of. He will work as a librarian, whose work is fascinating because printed books were banned on Earth to avoid deforestation, and he will meet for the first time the great books of humanity. When he finally gets the chance to explore the lunar surface, he will come across a rare hermit who will become his spiritual Master. A very human story, despite taking place in an exotic and unusual space.

The truth is that I admire the moon from a distance but having known someone like Francesc, representing him and learning every day with him is like being on the moon. I don’t have enough words to thank him for what he has brought to my life. Great novels, the best non-fiction books, authors who have believed in me and we have achieved great success together, and at the same time, I have a good person and a friend by my side.

It was fate: when I started with my own agency, someone called the phone. It usually diverted the calls to the switchboard, but that call did not, so I picked up and on the other side Francesc was asking if it would be possible to send an original, get to know each other and work together. Fortune, luck, chance made me take that call and that’s where our adventure began 17 years ago, and we still have a very encouraging road ahead of us because Francesc shines, invents, creates, and is one step ahead of trends. That’s why he’s a number one author in most of the genres he tackles, and he also has the gift of making those around shine and help them to bring out their talent. His latest novel is perfect as a summer reading, but any of his many books are recommendable because they always provide the reader with that little thing that makes him think deep, and keep one of the essential things in life: happiness.

Coia Valls is writer of seven novels, and our story began with a casual lunch in a tiny restaurant in the Gracia neighborhood. Coia came with Xulio R. Trigo, her partner and author of the agency, to discuss about his literary things. Coia’s honest smile, her proximity, her way of being captivated me from the very first moment. Coia is a woman that fills the places, although she tries to be discreet, but she has a light, a special light, and when she told me that she also wrote, a world was opened for me: a new adventure, a path to start together that we have been walking since 2008.

We have grown up together in this literary adventure and the truth is that we have forged a healthy friendship, which some say does not exist, because “you cannot mix work and friendship”. I had the opportunity to think of her for a project. I finally did it and I made no mistake: we published EL MERCADER, a book that is still alive today, after almost eight years and we started a career in Ediciones B, together with Ernest Folch, which was extraordinary.

This year we released her last novel, LOS CAMINOS DE LA LUZ (the paths of light), the story of BRAILLE. It has been special again with a character as important as Braille, who invented the alphabet for the blind, special for who he is and for this novel written from the heart. She put himself in the skin of a character who was born seeing and then enters the deepest darkness. How a child and his relatives overcome a hard blow like this in a small rural French village, and during the revolutionary France: this is the story of Louis Braille, in an atmosphere that reminds us of LES MISÉRABLES by Victor Hugo.

Coia couldn’t make a better novel and for this reason, I can’t stop recommending it, because I believe that apart from being a beautiful story, it is necessary to give voice to someone who, from the shadow, has enlightened many people. Only Coia with her special light could have written this novel.

In this blog we are always recommending books and this month, those who already know their holiday destination, I hope they also thought of which book or books will accompany them during their leisure time. Today, one of the novelties of the season, the new book by Malenka Ramos, LA PRINCESA DE MÁRMOL Y CRISTAL (The princess of marble and crystal) which is a fantastic summer reading. It has all the ingredients to keep you hooked because Malenka uses the mystery again and makes us believe what it’s not… And adding new elements to the story like love and a charismatic female protagonist, which help make it an addictive novel.

Samuel Ross is a writer and a psychiatrist known by his studies of criminal behavior. After a night of drunkenness, he’s the witness of the death of Arturo Coelho, partner of the businessman Markus Pastrana, investigated for embezzlement of funds, arms trafficking and the missing of several young women. He remembers it all like a dream, bits and pieces in his brain without any order until a week later he receives a letter: Salomé, the young woman who took the life of that man, describes him every minute of that terrible night and asks him for a favor, his help. The same night Salomé shows up at Samuel’s home. She needs to tell him her story, confess her reasons that lead her to all that madness- A story about love, pain, about the most inhuman cruelty. A story that will change the life of our protagonist forever. Because in this story… Nothing is what it seems.

Malenka Ramos already has a name in the publishing world and for me, she’s one of the women that deserves even more, because she manages all the registers, which is not easy, and this happens because she’s a great reader, since always, and that is captured on every page.

June is characterized by for many things: it’s summer, even though it doesn’t look like it, school is over, and we are lucky to celebrate the Madrid Book Fair. I love el Retiro full of stands, the excitement of the authors, the publishers and the librarians, and also the people who fill the weekend this wonderful park with the intention of spending a family day, where books are important. This fills me with joy because it’s a way to cultivate the power of reading in the family, something basic so children and teenagers get to know that a book can always be a good life or traveler companion.

Some of our authors have been signing: Paz Castelló with her thriller LA LLAVE 104, a lucid portrait of the crisis and a denunciation of political corruption. Alejandro Palomas has been also there with UN SECRETO, the new story of Guille that already made us fall in love with UN HIJO, or Emma Lire with PONE EN MI PIEL, the novel that shares the story of Petrus Gonsalvus, the King from the Canary Islands, who stars the real tale of The Beauty and The Beast. Jordi Tello, writer of 1816, EL AÑO QUE NO HUBO VERANO, was also in Madrid to sign his latest prose book full of thoughts and inspirational quotes about love breakups. Víctor Amela with YO PUDE SALVAR A LORCA, a charming novel both for the lovers of Garcia Lorca and for those who are not so fond of him, David Lozano, who has just published the children book series  Mayra Brócoli, and Ana Alcolea, writer of the children book EL FANTÁSTICO MUNDO DE LA ÓPERA, were also among the guests of the Book Fair. Finally, Francesc Miralles is signing books this weekend of the book I talked about last week, LA BIBLIOTECA DE LA LUNA, a unique story that, despite taking place in the moon, tells a very human story with the inspirational touch present in Francesc’s style, who never ceases to surprise us with his literary talent.

For those who have never come to the Fair, I highly recommend it, because the place is perfect and the atmosphere is amazing. This is where I leave you with this video we created in the agency so you can write down the books that will accompany you this summer on the beach or on the mountain. Holidays are a wonderful time to find a moment to get hooked on a book.   

I am very excited to write this blog because Francesc Miralles is back with another novel. LA BIBLIOTECA DE LA LUNA (the Moon Library), a wonderful book that mixes the traditional with the futuristic flawlessly. As always, Miralles is ahead in time and creates a great character, a tycoon called Kumar, who establishes the first human colony in the moon, Exovillage, for the richest ones. Verne, a linguist that works in a call center, is in love with Moira, a telecom engineer that lives in Exovillage and suffers from “space melancholy”. However, Verne manages to move to the moon to work as a librarian (the printed books were banned from Earth to avoid deforestation) and he will find texts that seek intellectual perfection. When Verne starts exploring the moon surface, he comes across a rare hermit that will become his Zen Master.

With this novel, Miralles knows how to manage, as always, two of the things that make his literature unique and special. A human story, even though it takes place in the moon, with inspirational touches that make this a perfect novel that will surely work, because in addition of a great story, provides the reader with some values  such as the conservation of paper versus the problem of deforestation, the true love and small inspirational pills that will make the reader underline the whole Miralles’ book. A learning of life that the reader carries in his backpack. Spectacular and quick to read, Miralles surprises again with his literature and that fans of his bestseller LOVE IN A LOWERCASE will not be disappointed. Thank you Francesc for making a better world with your novels, although sometimes I think we will have to move to the moon to live in peace.