As is already known, there are two types of readers, those of us who are still anchored to paper and those who have let themselves be seduced by new technologies. At the end of the summer, I heard someone praising the convenience of the e-book for going to the beach because it doesn't weigh anything, it doesn't get wet, it doesn't get damaged. I was shocked, theatricalizing my reaction a little: there is nothing I like more than that great novel I have read by the sea that ends up crumpled, the pages wavy and, when you go to put it on the shelf, a few grains of sand still fall to the ground.

Many years ago, almost thirty, I read the novel Mal de amores, by the Mexican writer Ángeles Mastretta (Puebla de Zaragoza, 1949) and I fell in love with this author—a love for life—and that passionate love story set in Puebla during the Mexican Revolution at the beginning of the 20th century, that of Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa. The inescapable love of young Emilia Sauri for a childhood friend, the rebellious and incorruptible Daniel Cuenca, has now arrived on the Netflix platform, in a series also titled Mal de amores. It was directed by Catalina Aguilar Mastretta, the author's daughter, and from my point of view this makes the adaptation—with the inevitable loss of depth that almost always exists between the book and the audiovisual—exude great affection and respect for the original work. If you want to watch the series I won't tell you not to; but if you want to accept a recommendation, read the novel by Mastretta, one of the great Mexican voices, who always places at the center of her stories female figures who fiercely defend their longing for independence.

In 2007, the Nobel Prize in Literature celebrated the long, prestigious and committed literary career of Doris Lessing, who received the news with the calm of her 88 years, just as she was arriving home loaded with groceries.

This summer we went to Brittany to rediscover a landscape that seduced us years ago and, above all, to be able to rest for a few days from the suffocating and overwhelming heat we had at home. We achieved this goal because the Atlantic air stopped the thermometers during the day and cooled the nights by the sea.

I have often spoken with editors and booksellers about an issue that is quite incomprehensible: collections of short stories or narratives – say some and others – are difficult to sell. In most cases, all of us participating in the conversation agree that the short story is an excellent genre, that we are a country with a very good tradition of short story writers, but, alas, the idea has taken hold that readers are not in favor of them, so short stories are published little. Few are also written, and we don't know which came first, the chicken or the egg. It is also significant that short story awards are significantly less substantial than novel awards.

We have all thought, at some point, "there are people who are unlucky." Sometimes it's true: there are very dramatic lives, people who have suffered major setbacks. But there are also those people who are simply convinced they are very unlucky. They tell you that everything has gone wrong for them, that they don't get along with their family, that their friends have disappointed them, that society doesn't value them.

This heat that suffocates and weakens us is, as it could not be otherwise, a great generator of conversation topics this summer. What about climate change, what about adapting to it, what about air conditioners doing us more harm than good. In many of these exchanges of ideas and experiences, I have detected a common element.

It often happens to me – and I take for granted it's a generational thing – that in my circle, the fact that my husband and I don't watch series or movies together is met with surprise. I say it must be generational because only people our age remember when families used to gather to watch TV, all at the same time and on the same channel.

Years ago, losing your health, being certain you are closer to the end has, in my opinion, no appeal. Perhaps the only one is learning, but I am one of those who think that life teaches you so many beautiful and fruitful things that this lesson, the fragility of your life and that of others, is not very rewarding.

In this article I would like to make two recommendations. The first is that you read The Abandoned Woman, by Balzac, which Viena Edicions has published in the collection Petits Plaers, translated by Josep Maria Pinto. The second recommendation is that, if you are one of those who have the habit —like me— of reading with a pencil in hand to underline especially beautiful or interesting phrases or paragraphs, this time you let it go. I let it go when I realized I was underlining practically everything.

Siri Hustvedt's faithful followers filled L’Auditori and, as if we were at mass – in concentrated silence – followed the conversation the writer had with Anna Guitart.

They say it's never too late to make great discoveries. I admit I haven't been very interested in graphic novels until now, but today I want to recommend one: Regreso al Edén, by the Valencian Paco Roca. A friend recommended it to me, knowing my fondness for old family photos.

The other day, one weekday afternoon, I passed through one of the most touristy areas of the center of Barcelona. I was heading to Casa Amatller to participate in a book club I had been invited to. The activity is organized by Cases Singulars, the entity that manages the schedule in various heritage sites in Barcelona, such as private houses, libraries, and palaces.

Manolo García made a proposal to the thousands of people filling the Lluís Companys Olympic Stadium: we want to offer you joy and for you to give us joy. And the offer was enthusiastically accepted, of course. Because we all want joy, and that night of reunion we were sure of achieving it. We also wanted to return it to the musicians who, with their songs, were about to transport us to the best years of our lives. And so it was.

I have had a strange experience these days, and the perplexity still lingers. I know that many people —perhaps some of you reading me now— have lived it and, like me, have accepted it with a resignation that leaves a bitter taste in your mouth.

Sometimes a writer is immersed in a novel, has planned its structure, has worked on the characters, and perhaps has written pages and pages of it. But at a certain moment –it could happen any day, even on one of those days when you feel least inspired–, they write a sentence and immediately realize that in that sentence “there is the novel”. It is a truly glorious moment that the author will most likely celebrate with a shout, or by abandoning writing and going for a walk, or going out onto the balcony to light a cigarette, as the case may be.

Imogen Pollock wrote a biography of her mother many years ago in which she described her as an irritable, cruel, and narcissistic woman. Her mother was Enid Blyton, the author of a prolific body of children's literature that, like millions of children around the world, turned me into a voracious reader.

Looking back can and should be beautiful. This is one of the phrases that will serve as a basis for me, this Sant Jordi, to dedicate the book We Were So Young, where I describe in words some photographs from my family albums. My intention in writing it is to invite readers to review their own albums and to let themselves be carried away by this kind of nostalgia that does not cause suffering.

This Tuesday, the book War Diary of a 'Baby' by the Badalona poet Josep Gual, who died in 2005, will be presented at the Museu de Badalona. Another Badalona poet, the philologist Valentí Soler, has taken care of the transcription of the manuscript of the notebook that Gual wrote from April 28, 1938, when he joined the conscription called up at the athletics tracks in Carrer Iris, until he was sentenced to forced labor in September of the same year. The book has been published by Edicions del Pont del Petroli, which already has several poetry collections by Josep Gual in its catalog.

In this Sunday's newspaper, Àlex Gutiérrez interviewed the comedian Maria Rovira, known as Oye Sherman, with whom I had the good fortune to meet doing radio a few years ago. I remember how impressed I was that such a young girl showed such great interest in language and culture, and sparked a quick and funny mind without any desire to grab the spotlight.