Bruno Blog

I am especially excited about the book I recommend today, as after the international success of IKIGAI, its authors, Francesc Miralles and Hector Garcia have dared to write a book for the teenagers who need answers, the parents who need to know how to provide such answers and for educators or pedagogues who need the tools to guide them. A short book which is clear and beautiful as well as useful. In a context such as the current one, this book makes more sense than ever. The uncertainty of what is to come is the big question every day and, for teenagers, who find it difficult to know what path to follow and what to study, this book is a wonderful guide to discover their aims in life. This is something that many adults do not know yet, it is complex and therefore it is natural to feel stress of anxiety before such matters. Through the trip of the main character, readers will learn to boost their talents and discover their path in life.

I am certain that if I did not have a father like mine, reader and with beliefs that could well be taken form a self-help manual, but which are actual life lessons, I might have been unable to start an agency and start this project. I am sure he would be a reader and recommender of IKIGAI FOR YOUNG READERS to share ideas which seem easy to learn but difficult to apply. I am lucky that he has always helped me and has known how to do so, but for those who do not have that ability, this book is a treasure, a compass for a world that has turned into an uphill battle, even if we are able to reach the top if we really aim for it. The keys can be found in this book of gorgeous edition, published by Destino in Spanish and Fan Books in Catalan. We thank them both for such a lovely and refined edition.

People’s character is one of our trademarks, however, character can be molded or changed. I have changed mine. As a teenager I was quick tempered, as my grandmother used to say, and I would immediately raise my voice, but soon afterwards I would regret it and apologize for my behaviour, but not for my opinion, as I have always been a person who has taken a stand and defended what I thought, even if it differed from other people’s opinions. 
 
However, time has taught me that even if it is good to have convictions, it is important to know how to bite your tongue at certain times. And when I read this thriller, BAJO LA PIEL, by Susana Rodríguez Lezaun, author of the trilogy SIN RETORNO, DEUDAS DEL FRÍO and TE VERÉ ESTA NOCHE which has sold over 30.000 copies, I thought that the main character had that strong and uncompromising personality, which may be considered difficult or mean, which she is, but in the case of Marcela Pieldelobo I would say she is a person with a square clear mind and who doesn’t mind breaking the rules.
 
Marcela Pieldelobo is not easy to deal with. Born in Biescas, a small village in the Aragonese Pyrenees, she has been an inspector for the National Police Force in Pamplona for the past decade. A woman who is excessive in her habits and affections, and in the original tattoo that curls around her body and which hardly anyone knows about. She is convinced that orders are open to interpretation, that there are things that are better kept to oneself and that closed doors can be unlocked if you know how to open them. Even if you don’t have a court order. In the novel, the past, in the form of an abusive father, who reappears after the death of her mother, hammers on her door, but Marcela has more urgent things to get to, such as the case of an abandoned baby in a lonely car park and a wrecked hire car with no trace of the driver, but with bloodstains and wheel marks… When the clues lead to a well-known company owned by one of the most traditional and influential local families, her superiors decide to take her off the case… But Marcela, true to her principles and her instincts, insists on going further, even at the expense, now, of her own life.
 
A fast-paced, exceptional thriller that will not disappoint the fans of the genre but will also appeal to those readers who are appealed by a well-written story with mystery and chilling scenes. Harper Collins continues to support an author who has a growing readership, her works have already been translated into Italian and Portuguese, and she has an option contract for the television rights to a trilogy that after seven years of life has not stopped selling. Are you going to miss it?

In 2020 the world came to a standstill and our lives did too. It has not been easy, but for some people the pandemic created a new break in their busy lives where there was nothing but rushing, meetings and lack of free time. For many, including myself, this forced stop generated a reflection on what we all already know but do not apply, unless we are made to.

Thousands of years ago, human beings were harmoniously connected to the natural cycles of life. This link with the rhythms of nature provided our ancestors with health, energy and emotional well-being. Nowadays, we also live in tune with time, but we have disconnected from its original cadence and we no longer pay attention to our internal clocks, which are responsible for appetite, sleep, energy or fatigue we feel throughout the day, resulting in cardiovascular problems, metabolic diseases such as diabetes or obesity, psychological disorders and, in the most serious cases, a greater incidence of certain types of cancer.

Now, the doctors Eduard and Carla Estivill preset us EL MÉTODO TOKEI, published by Plaza & Janés and Rosa dels Vents. Based on chronobiology, this method is a fully-fledged training to learn to listen to our body and reconnect with its rhythms. Thanks to their simple and practical advice, available to everyone, we will be able to synchronize our Tokei or inner clock to enjoy a life full of optimism and health. Eduard Estivill sold more than three million copies of his DUERMETE NIÑO method all over the world and now he is back with another method where he encourages us to reconnect with ourselves following a clear and natural plan. In a year in which we have realized, more than ever, that health is the most important aspect, this practical and totally accessible book gives us a method to keep us in full shape, and prevent avoidable illnesses, just by listening to the signals of our inner clock. An essential tool for living a longer and better life.

The famous saying: “things were better in the good old days” sounded like something only older people would say, but I must admit that I agree with it. As you get older, you understand it and have no choice but to take it in. However, I would like to be optimistic and think that we still have many positive experiences ahead, even when time leaves its mark, and memories, many memories, gather in that little box called heart. As time goes by, I feel the box shrinks due to the accumulation.

Besides, with age, no one sugar coats the reality and you realize the absences, the silences, the people who remain and those who are gone. Without meaning to, my mind takes me to that past where everything seemed perfect.

Just as happens to the characters of the novel EL BALL DELS ESTUDIANTS, by Anna Crusafont published by Univers, where after years without seeing each other, four friends meet again to celebrate the anniversary of the ball they used to attend together every year. None of them is what she used to be, they have grown, they have lived, and life has led each of them on their own path, although perhaps not the one they wanted or dreamed of. A novel about friendship and becoming aware that life sets the soundtrack of our days.

Anna Crusafont, who has been translated into three languages with her first novel Isola Bella, now returns with a new genre story, with an excellent style, but for all audiences, and with a topic that will make all nostalgic people fall in love, which in the end, involves the majority of us, because we all have a little box of memories, and one way or another we fill it with the moments that we do not want to forget, and which remain engraved in our minds forever.

I have always liked love stories, with or without a happy ending. Love is something that always works and that is why it is one of the main plots in many of the novels we read.

This week is special, not only because I am in love with the novel I want to present you but also because it is the first novel by a new author, José Antonio Lucero, who will see his dream of publishing come true. When we met him, he came all the way to Barcelona to sign the contract with the agency and to see us face to face, things we could do before the pandemic and that we miss now, I was touched to see the special sparkle in his eyes when we explained everything that had happened to his novel since it came into our hands. It was a special meal because you could see his excitement and his eagerness for the publication day for LA VIDA EN UN MINUTO, his second novel, although his first with us and with Penguin Random House, under the Ediciones B imprint. The pandemic forced the book to come out later than planned, and it has taken us all a long time to hold on to that illusion, but this week is the week of the publication of this very special novel, with a wonderful cover and a story that will not leave readers indifferent.

LA VIDA EN UN MINUTO is the story of two young people who flee Madrid in the years after the Civil War. Julita is an upper-class girl who does not want to follow the guidelines imposed by her family and Daniel is a boy from the suburbs who is running away from his past in the war. United by the force of destiny, the two young people will coincide in a long journey on the express from Madrid to La Coruña, fleeing from what others have planned for them. There they will get to know each other, and their complicity will be born, without knowing that the train is headed for a catastrophe that will change their lives forever.

The minute it takes for two eyes to cross. LA VIDA EN UN MINUTO rescues a sadly unknown episode of the post-war period, the tragedy of a train crash that claimed hundreds of victims and was silenced by the Franco regime’s press. It does so to show us that love and life can sometimes be born in the rubble.

A great historical novel for a wide audience and one that deserves to have the success that both publishers and I believe it should have. A silenced event, a love story like those of ROMEO AND JULIET or JACK and ROSE in Titanic. Those great stories that thrill us all until the end.