According to the dictionary of the Institut d'Estudis Catalans, the definition of heroine can be: "A person distinguished by their great courage, by their fortitude in suffering. The main character of a legend, a story, etc." But also: "A diacetyl derivative of morphine, with the formula C₂₁H₂₃NO₅"...from which it is obtained by treating it with acetic anhydride, and whose consumption creates dependence."

With FarewellsJulian Barnes (Leicester, 1946) does not say goodbye to literature, because he is supposed to continue reading until his death or until his eyes and brain allow it, but he does say goodbye to writing books and to his readers. When I say he's saying goodbye, I mean it literally.And he also makes this explicit in the final paragraphs, directly addressing those who are reading it: "I hope you have enjoyed our relationship over the years. I certainly have. Your presence has pleased me (when you think about it, I would be nothing without you)."

I've often wondered where my ideas come from and what happens if I change them. I'm always open to doing so: give me a solid reason why, and I'll hesitate. Let me think about it for a while, and maybe I'll take your advice, or maybe I'll end up right back where I started. Over the years, I've realized that my way of understanding the world has deep roots, stemming from a thread of thought that predates me and will outlive me: tradition, history, and the language that verbalizes it all.

The intimate life of Sheila Heti (Toronto, 1976) can be read in more than 25 languages. The Canadian author has been experimenting with autobiographical literature for almost two decades thanks to books such as Maternity (2018; in Catalan in Más Libros) and How a person should be (2012; in Spanish in Alpha Decay). In Alphabetical newspapers, published by Angle Editorial in Catalan translated by Maria Bosom and published by Lumen in Spanish translated by Sara Barquinero, presents a proposal of remarkable formal singularity: it arranges in alphabetical order and gleans ten years of diaries that end up constructing an ingenious, amusing and at the same time melancholic text about a decisive period.

In June 2022, the American Rebecca Solnit (1961) was unable to come to Barcelona, ​​where she was due to speak at the CCCB, and we had to settle for seeing and hearing her through a big screen. Three years later, this June he was there in person., in this case to share with us his latest published book, In Praise of the Unexpected Path, which links to Hope in the darkness, where he reflected on activism and confirmed its contribution to achieving results, beyond the often self-serving discourses that encourage inaction.

The book had been out for a few months In the land of wonders (Ángulo Editorial, 2025), by philosopher and professor Eulàlia Bosch, haunted my house. Unconsciously, it approached and moved away: the day it arrived, its colors insisted on being on the dining room table; at dusk, it waited patiently for an opportunity on the nightstand; the next day, with the arrival of a new book, it found itself displaced to the office desk. Days pass, and there are readings that never find their moment, until you finally start them and understand why you've always kept them close, taking an erratic walk around the house, avoiding relegating them entirely to the pile of pending titles that deep down you know you'll never read.

"What if I wrote a novel about Nicolas Cage's hair?" he asked himself a few years ago. Albert Pijuan (Calafell, 1985), novelist, playwright and translator. "It seemed to me too absurd a starting point to let him lose." –he continues–. If the ideas survive the passage of time and that obsession persists, I know that it will haunt me until the end of time and then I have no choice but to write it down."

With this fourth novel, the film director and performer Miranda July –having just turned fifty– has overcome a kind of symbolic barrier that had been erected in the middle of the path of his life and has entered the realm of the Great Writers. But she didn't do it dressed as a distinguished lady, but rather, she got down on all fours and fucked everything that was in front of her: boys, older ladies, and girls, in abundance. She got dirty, she descended into the deepest abyss of femininity, and she emerged renewed, like the protagonist of this novel: "She could have always been like this, like in this room: imperfect, genderless, playful, shameless. She had everything she needed in her pockets, a complete soul."

She has a shy look, and speaks in a small voice that the mask still makes it harder to decipher, but Fatoumata Kebe's ambition is enormous. Doctor in astronomy from the Sorbonne University, astrophysicist and aspiring to one day travel to the Moon, she has visited Barcelona to inaugurate the Kosmopolis festival of the CCCB, which has had as one of its main thematic axes the look at outer space from the point of view of science and literature. Kebe spoke about her first book, The Book of the Moon in which she combines scientific, historical and mythical considerations about the Earth's only satellite.