The 3 best books of Ildefonso Falcones

Popular maxims and sentences should always be taken as guidance, on any aspect to which they are applied. I say this because the fact that it is more difficult to stay than to arrive would serve the case of Ildefonso Falcones. It got there, reached the pinnacle, and despite the difficulty of keeping readers' attention, it continued to rake in huge sales for each new book.

Without a doubt, this author came to the literary forefront as a real shock. The Catedral del Mar fought in sales levels with the then mythical Shadow of the Wind, from Carlos Ruiz Zafón. The greatest merit is that this great historical novel, with clear influences from Ken Follet, materialized for 5 years, combining its writing with dedication to the legal profession. The writer as a fold of the person dedicated to something else and who reconnects with his world when the day and his tasks come to an end.

And in it Falcones continues. During the day he defends his cases before the courts and at night he rescues his characters to apply his own justice as the creator of their stories.

Top novels by Ildefonso Falcones:

The Cathedral of the Sea

Without actually presenting itself as a novel of sagas in the style The pillars of the earth, (at least in a first appearance), this novel has that particular point of narration, of personal avatars parallel to the hoisting of a temple, with its meaning of work and time, with its evocation of the past reached in its stones until the day of today, with its fundamental themes about love and human evil of yesterday and today.

Synopsis: XIV century. The city of Barcelona is at its most prosperous moment; It has grown towards the Ribera, the humble fishermen's neighborhood, whose inhabitants decide to build, with the money of some and the effort of others, the largest Marian temple ever known: Santa María de la Mar.

A construction that is parallel to the hazardous story of Arnau, a servant of the earth who flees from the abuses of his feudal lord and takes refuge in Barcelona, ​​where he becomes a citizen and, with it, a free man. Young Arnau works as a groom, longshoreman, soldier and money changer.

An exhausting life, always under the protection of the Cathedral of the Sea, which was going to take him from the misery of the fugitive to the nobility and wealth. But with this privileged position also comes the envy of his peers, who plot a sordid conspiracy that puts his life in the hands of the Inquisition ...

The Cathedral of the Sea is a plot in which loyalty and revenge, betrayal and love, war and plague intersect, in a world marked by religious intolerance, material ambition and social segregation. All this makes this work not only an absorbing novel, but also the most fascinating and ambitious recreation of the lights and shadows of the feudal era.

The Cathedral of the Sea

The barefoot queen

We advance a few centuries from the Cathedral of the Sea and we move from Barcelona to Madrid and Seville. The eighteenth century exuded Enlightenment, but in the case of Spain it was surrounded by contradictions and marked social differences and moral doubles.

Synopsis: Ildefonso Falcones presents his new work, La reina descalza, a passionate and vivid recreation of Madrid and Seville from the mid-XNUMXth century, a moving story of friendship, passion and revenge that unites two women's voices in a song torn by freedom .

Now, with The Barefoot Queen, Ildefonso Falcones proposes a journey to an exciting time, colored by prejudice and intolerance. From Seville to Madrid, from the tumultuous hustle and bustle of the Triana gypsy house to the stately theaters of the capital; from tobacco smuggling to the persecution of the gypsy people; From the fusion of cultures to the birth of pre-flamenco, readers will enjoy a historical fresco populated by characters who live, love, suffer and fight for what they believe is right.

The barefoot queen

The inheritors of the Earth

You never fully know why an author gets a second part. If he really does it out of popular demand or because he wants to go back to recover those old spirits of characters that one day he left aside, feeling partly liberated and partly saddened (something like the son who leaves for an exciting job to Australia).

So the second part arrived. And, despite the risks of revisiting the perfect work, it triumphed again.

Synopsis: Barcelona, ​​1387. The bells of the church of Santa María de la Mar continue to ring for all the inhabitants of the Ribera neighborhood, but one of them listens to its ringing with special attention ...

Hugo Llor, the son of a deceased sailor, at the age of twelve works in the shipyards thanks to the generosity of one of the most appreciated men of the city: Arnau Estanyol. But his youthful dreams of becoming a shipbuilder will face a harsh and ruthless reality when the Puig family, staunch enemies of his mentor, take advantage of their position before the new king to execute a revenge that he had been cherishing for years.

From that moment on, Hugo's life oscillates between his loyalty to Bernat, Arnau's friend and only son, and the need to survive in a city unfair to the poor.

Forced to leave the Ribera neighborhood, he seeks work with Mahir, a Jew who teaches him the secrets of the world of wine. With him, among vineyards, vats and alembics, the boy discovers his passion for the land while meeting Dolça, the Jew's beautiful niece, who will become his first love. But this feeling, forbidden by customs and religion, will be the one that will provide you with the sweetest and bitterest moments of your youth.

The inheritors of the Earth

Other recommended books by Ildefonso Falcones

Slave of freedom

Cuba, mid-XNUMXth century… A ship carrying a sinister cargo arrives at the Caribbean island. More than seven hundred women and girls kidnapped from their native Africa arrive to work, until exhaustion, in the sugar cane fields and give birth to children who will also be slaves. Kaweka is one of them, a girl who will experience first-hand the horror of slavery on the hacienda of the cruel Marquis of Santadoma, but who will soon show those around her that she has the ability to commune with Yemayá. This is a fickle goddess who sometimes grants him the gift of healing and gives him the strength to lead his fellow race in the fight for freedom against oppressors who have succeeded in enslaving their bodies, but not their souls.

Madrid, current times… Lita, a young mulatto, is the daughter of Concepción, the woman who has spent her whole life serving in the house of the Marquises of Santadoma, in the heart of the Salamanca district, just as her ancestors did in colonial Cuba. Despite having studies and professional ambition, her job insecurity forces Lita to turn to the almighty lords of Santadoma in search of an opportunity in the bank owned by the Marquis. As she immerses herself in the finances of the company and in the past of this very rich family, the young woman discovers the origins of her fortune and decides to launch a legal battle in favor of dignity and justice, which her mother and all deserve. the women who gave their lives in the service of whites who never treated them as equals.

Slave of freedom
5/5 - (8 votes)

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