Clara Usón

A terrorist with delusions of grandeur. A teenager searching for her place in the world. An astounding generational portrait of the Spain of the 1980s, marked by political violence and dreams of freedom.

Rather than the number of victims Idoia López Riaño murdered in cold blood it was her icy beauty that attracted the attention of the media. Nicknamed the Tigress, she was not only an ETA terrorist but also a celebrity. Her story and her life are reconstructed in this extraordinary novel alongside that of Miren, a teenager who strives to be accepted despite the stigma of her father being a police officer, socially an enemy of the Basque people.

These are the 80s in the Basque Country, the years of lead and the dirty war between ETA terrorism and state terrorism. Everywhere Miren looks – at her friends, the boy she likes, her own father – everyone is divided, taking positions on one side or the other, like wild beasts in a fight to the death.

Beginning with the story of a daughter and a father doomed to never understand each other, Clara Usón masterfully reconstructs the life of Idoia López Riaño, inside and outside the terrorist group, and also the criminal repression plotted by the state. Both sides were responsible for the deaths of countless innocent victims and were the protagonists of one of the darkest pages in recent Spanish history.

“Clara Usón skillfully and subtly intertwines the two plots, merging them into a magnificent ending, where she displays her great narrative intelligence. […] Notable is the sensitivity and sharpness with which Usón constructs the character of Miren, a teenager trapped in the difficulties typical of her age. […] Clara Usón recreates, with the insight resulting from exhaustive research and enviable narrative skill, that turbulent Basque Country where political violence permeated everyday relationships. Nothing to reproach in this impeccable narrative architecture that supports the entire weight of the novel and, moreover, achieves the one thing we must demand from fiction: to expand our imagination and, with it, our understanding and knowledge.”—Babelia, El País

“A space where uncertainty and human complexity are deeply explored.”—La Razón

“Clara Usón delivers one of the best novels of the year [...], an extraordinary novel filled with diverse voices where the terrorist is the central axis.”—El Confidencial

“A writer who could pass for Basque without being one.”—El Mundo

“A story full of contrasts that delve into the filth of terrorism and the not-so-distant history of our country with the intention of questioning, of understanding. [...] A narrative that explores the 'lumpen' environment and the radicalism of both sides, highlighting the rampant sexism of the era. A setting where the puritanical and the despicable surprisingly go hand in hand.”—La Razón

“Clara Usón detests dogmas. The Barcelona writer combats them with her fictions. In her latest novel, she investigates the effect of that blind conviction on an entire generation. [...] A fiction with a very real undertone that keeps the reader on edge until the last page.”—El Diario Vasco

“Clara Usón is obsessed with evil, how it manifests, its faces, its frivolity. [...] She aims to unravel the reasons behind the strength of dogmas, how they drag us to ever darker places in the name, in this case, of a homeland.”—El Independiente 

“The Beasts revolves around this division of the two Spains, through a gallery of characters that provide a very vivid portrayal of an era. [...] One of the positive aspects to highlight in the book is how we hear the voices of both sides without any intervention from the author.”—La Vanguardia

“A brave work in which imagination challenges and completes reality.”—El Cultural

“A thorny subject handled with great skill and tact by Usón.”—Culturas

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Literature Prize 2018

Built around suicide, which Camus considered the only truly serious philosophical problem, Clara Usón has written a novel based on her own history, full of humour, philosophy, and devastating revelations.

Clara Usón explores Sandra Mozarowski’s turbulent career as an actress in Spanish nude films in the 70s, and draws parallels with her own life. The actress died at the age of 18 after throwing herself off the balcony of her home, although rumour has it she was murdered by Spain’s intelligence services after being impregnated by King Juan Carlos. The author finds tragicomic resonances with her own process of self-destruction, and the complex relationship she maintained with her mother from childhood.

This is the true story of two women, two generations who come into conflict when the country’s reality changes with the advent of democracy, bringing down the curtain on the dark decades of Francoism. The mother is an alcoholic, cloistered in spite of herself in the domestic role assigned to women during the years of dictatorship. The daughter, like Sandra Mozarowski, is caught up in the years of liberation and excess, convinced the future belongs to her, never realizing it might be taken away.

“Because El asesino tímido (The Shy Assassin) is undoubtedly one of her most brilliant books, written in prose that manages to trap the reader from the first page…El asesino tímido confirms Usón as one of the best contemporary authors, but also makes us look inside ourselves, even if that means finding a reflection, an image that might be too real.” Víctor Fernández, La Razón

“If the novel, as Usón herself points out, is what Cervantes called "unleashed writing in which everything fits" (a true statement if ever there was one), there’s no doubt we’re dealing with a novel that deserves to be savoured by a good number of readers.” Ovidio Paredes, Huffington Post

“Clara Usón undertakes an open-heart self-portrait. At the same time, this intra-family history of Spain going from the [Franco] Regime to the Transition, with a hated mother and self-destructive daughter, also recounts the life of the young muse of nude films, Sandra Mozarovski, likely lover of King Juan Carlos, who died under suspicious circumstances. The secret of these digressions is resolved by Usón’s mastery as one of the greatest prose writers in recent years.” Babelia, 21 April 2018

“Full of deep reflections, between tragedy and comedy, the book reveals a mature craft.” El Mundo. Tendències, 19 April 18

 “A pop novel where mysterious threads join the narrator to Mozarovski, Pavese and Wittgenstein to explain that there’s nothing more coherent than delirium.” Marta Sanz

"The author as a child, adolescent and young woman, not just a narrator and researcher, gradually takes ownership of the story until it culminates in the final revelation (becoming confessional, almost expiatory). This is undoubtedly the most outstanding chapter in a book true to Cervantes’s tradition of ‘unleashed writing’." Ana Rodríguez Fischer, Babelia

"A sensational book. Brave, surprising, wild and loving". Marta Sanz 

"Irony, intrigue and tragedy go hand in hand in a work with which Clara Usón returns to show off a truly enviable narrative mastery". Forbes

"A strong combination; bitter in some parts and intriguing in many others. It won’t leave you indifferent". Fernando García, La Vanguardia

"Activating her own memory, she has managed to articulate an intimate portrait of the vital contradictions that define an entire generation when it comes to managing the failure of an illusion of change". Jaime Iglesias, Gara

"Plagued with reflections, between tragedy and comedy, the book reveals a mature voice". El Mundo

“A wonderful story.” Concita de Gregorio, La Repubblica

“An intense novel about life and our relationship with death; about growing up and learning to reflect upon the years of youthful recklessness with respect, in which we can find the presence of Ludwig Wittgenstein when he said that ‘only death gives meaning to life’.” ANSA, Cultura

“A book that talks about the thing we should silence, the ones we can’t say but that, in reality, are the only ones that matter.” Il Fatto Quotidiano

“Clara Usón is a brave writer as few are, powerful when handling images and words, acrobatic and ungraspable. We have no choice but to paraphrase her (and Pavese) —although now I am talking about life and not death—, when we find ourselves face to face with this novel, and we see our reflection in it”. Antonella Latanzi, Tuttolibri

“El asesino tímdo, by Clara Usón, is a little miracle”. Cristina Battocletti (Il Sole)

“Creative and experimental works such as El asesino tímido is what our age needs, which asks for literature to, above all, surprise the reader and to appear alive even at the expense of putting itself at risk”. Antonio Debenedetti (Corriere della Sera)

A branch manager of a bank from the east of Spain who has sold preferred stocks. A young soldier, Fermín Galán, who decides to put his republican ideals into practice and bring about a revolution in Jaca, in 1930. A fanatical priest in the Jasenovac concentration camp in the Independent State of Croatia during the Second World War. They all face situations where they have to accept a risk, but their courage to the test, in the interest of what they hold most important: revolution, faith, money, in comparison with which conscience is just a weak barrier. "Courage" explores the wounds of the past and the greatest rupture in contemporary mankind. The reader will be astonished by glimpses of times, places and people, forming a novel which, ultimately, tackles the complexity and contradictions of human nature.

Beautiful, intelligent and outgoing, Ana has a bright future ahead. She is the best medical student in her class at Belgrade, and the pride and joy of her father, the Serbian general Ratko Mladic, whom she adores. One night, after a trip to Moscow, at the age of 23, Ana Mladic takes her father’s favourite gun and makes a decision that will change her family’s life forever. What happened in Moscow? Did Ana see the other side of her father, her hero, regarded by many as a war criminal? The tragedy of Ana Mladic adds a familiar, real, and nearby dimension to the terrible drama of the war in the Balkans, Europe’s most recent conflict and the background of this absorbing novel.

"A magnificent literary text in which past and present are merged wisely, encompassing a century of confrontations, disgrace and crimes through the painful experiences of the elusive, enigmatic protagonist." Juan Goytisolo

“Few cases such as that of Ana Mladic reflect the full immensity of a fate that no human being can avoid: the loss of innocence. A tremendous novel, which establishes the author as one of the great European writers of our time.” Ana Maria Moix

“Someone said that the 21st century novel would mix truth with relativism, sincerity with irony, construction with deconstruction, and hope with melancholy. Clara Usón’s novel has all of this and something more important: humanity.” Kirmen Uribe

"To the foreign reader this book will explain what happened here in the ‘90s with a lot of credibility, while those who witnessed the events will be able to assess the author’s passion for research and her skills as a writer, both of which this journalist considers excellent.” Boris Pavelić, Zadarski list (Croatia)

In 1984, Fede has just turned thirteen: he's no longer a child, not yet an adult, just a problem. He has run away from his father and stepmother's house, determined to live intensely while emulating Sid Vicious. Soon, he understands that his place is with his mother, whom he has not seen for a year. His adventure runs parallel to that of Marta, a wild painter, who views the art world with irony and skepticism. It's the touching story of a boy who crafts his own interpretation of the world and takes it to its ultimate consequences.

The novelist Clara Usón portrays with subtlety, intensity, and humor the lives of three sisters who, much like in the drama of the Russian author Anton Chekhov, pursue a life worthy of living, far from stifling normalcy. Three women who do not lose hope and who strive to escape from a mundane future, even if sometimes that means running away.

Almandoz, a young woman from Barcelona, who at the end of the 20th century is going through a personal crisis and lives in fear of a dull future, finds herself unexpectedly transported to the year 1892. Clad in a hat and bustle, she appears on the estate of the writer Anton Chekhov in Melikhovo, Russia, whose work she knows and admires. But the pleasure of interacting with the great writer in person is accompanied by many inconveniences: Lucia must justify her unusual presence within the large Chekhov family, as well as adapt to the routine of a strange century, without running water or flush toilets, and in which independent women arouse suspicion.

Laura Alonso, thirty-five years old, owns her own apartment. She's a partner at one of the city's top tax advisory firms and is in a more or less stable relationship with an intelligent and capable man. She considers herself a balanced woman reasonably satisfied with her life. So why is she sitting on a psychiatrist's couch talking about her lover's wife? Why doesn't she care anymore if her clients pay taxes or not? Why is she terrified of living as part of a couple?

In her first novel, both Dionysian and transgressive, Clara Usón depicts the chaotic and marginalized environment of fairground workers, homosexuals, pimps, and transvestites gathered around the festivities of San Juan in Ciutadella. Through the eyes of Juani, an unattractive fair worker with beautiful green eyes, fantastical, pathetic, naive, and cruel, we catch a glimpse of the changing world of nightclubs, fairground attractions, popular celebrations, melodramatic romances, and soap operas in which she moves.