Diagonal Manhattan, by Xavier Bosch (Column); Strong heart, by Silvia Soler (Universo), and This piece of lifeThe three novels originally written in Catalan that sold the most copies in 2025, according to the Libridata list, an online digital platform linked to the Guild of Booksellers of Catalonia that records the daily sale of books in more than 150 points in Catalonia, including bookstores and large stores. Bosch, Soler and Solé were already the best-selling authors during the last Sant Jordi festival. To which we should add Joël Dicker, although since it is a translation, it is not included in this ranking.

More than sixty Catalan authors They have traveled to Mexico to represent Barcelona at the 39th International Book Fair (FIL) From Guadalajara, where the city is the guest of honor. Ten of the participants summarize their journey across the Atlantic in their own words.

"Perhaps since Josep Pla we have not had a narrator who, with such a sharp journalistic eye, walked the earth, contemplated it and described it with such precision," says the writer Xavier Bosch about the literary work of journalist Lluís Foix (Rocafort de Vallbona, Urgell, 1943). The writer entered The Vanguard in the late 1960s and has been associated with the house for more than five decades, as a translator, journalist, correspondent, commentator, director and in other management positions. When he turned 70, he began a second life, because he began to write books "memorialistic, not memoirs" - he claimed - with The marinade always arrives (2013): "I have lived through interesting times and have met people who have been protagonists of political situations, but also literary ones," justified in the ARAIn 2016 he won the Josep Pla award for That revolving door, a journalistic memoir.

1. Lluís Bassat made the "We are 6 million" announcement in 1987. It was a magnificent slogan that, with just three words and in the first person plural, brought everyone together and immortalized the demographic snapshot of a historic moment. In 2023, Catalonia surpassed 8 million inhabitants for the first time, and the serious thing is that it seems no one had foreseen it. We are another two million people who were here thirty-five years ago, and we have burst at the seams of the country because short-sighted politics has led us to the current situation. Political parties, without exception, when in power, basically work to get votes for the next term, fill their mouths with medium-term initiatives, and forget to plan for the world of their grandchildren. They forget that they will pass away, Catalonia will remain, and future generations will suffer the consequences of these trickle-down policies that, at this moment, are suffocating us.

When she was thirteen or fourteen, Najat El Hachmi worked evenings at a local fruit and vegetable shop. "There I realized how hard it is to earn money," she recalls. She used the money she earned to buy a coat. Since then, she hadn't worked as a saleswoman until this Thursday, when her publisher asked her to work as a bookseller at the Casa del Libro on Rambla de Catalunya, alongside authors like Xavier Bosch, Martí Gironell, Toni Cruanyes, Estrella Solé, and Borja de Riquer, ready to recommend their favorite books. What actually happened was that customers who caught the writers standing at the counter took the opportunity to buy their new releases with a dedication. It was an early Sant Jordi, with more peace of mind but no discount.

1. Barça is one night away from the Copa del Rey final, two knockout rounds away from the Champions League final, and nine games away from winning La Liga. Hansi Flick, in fact, said, both in the locker room and in the press, that the most important title is La Liga. And he's well on his way to winning it in his first year in charge. Barça, after thrashing Girona, are top of the table, three points ahead of Real Madrid, and have the advantage. goal average in favor of the Whites, and Ancelotti's men must come to Lluís Companys. Football-wise, nothing should cause them to suffer. The team is well-oiled and, in 2025, has become addicted to winning. All the players have a plan in mind, combining speed and efficiency with the ball at their feet, and when they don't have it, they bite like wolves to get it back as quickly as possible. The enthusiasm of the handful of youngsters at La Masia, the maturity of two Poles on form, and the form of some stars who would be wanted in any team—Pedri, De Jong, Kounde, Raphinha, Ferran—mean that, for now, no team plays more fun than Barça in Europe. The number of goals this season (139 in 45 games), on the way to a record, is evidence of this. The fact that the last defeat came in 2024 is another example of the competitiveness of this team that has brought laughter back to Barcelona fans. Even when a player is injured, his replacement makes his absence almost unnoticeable. It happened with Casadó in place of Bernal. Or with Szczesny in place of Ter Stegen. And when Fermín comes in for Olmo, he turns games around.

1. This March, Barça sent a survey to its members asking about what's working best for the club: women's football. The pile of folders asking for things Barça should be doing better is getting higher every day, but in the online survey, they ask for an opinion on why you attend, or don't, matches to see the European champions. When you've finished answering, they ask you if you want to answer what area of Catalonia you live in, whether you're male or female, and "what age range do you fall into?" And they give you six options: 18-30, 31-40, 41-50, 51-60, 61-70, over 70. I understand why underage members aren't consulted, but it's surprising that, in most surveys, after 70, there are no more categories... of old age. Whether you're 71, 85, or 94, the poll already places you on the brink of the abyss. Beyond that, nothing. You're 60, and look, you still have a track record. But, in the world of pollsters, when you're 70, it's all over the place. In a club where 8,000 members are over 80, in a country where life expectancy is 84, this limitation skews the results, is disrespectful, and, above all, demoralizes the more experienced population.

1. In Spain's judicial system, some always come out on top, while others always get the short end of the stick. The pity is that acquittal on all charges or a thorough licking of the tongue has nothing to do with reason or the truth of the facts. It all gets messed up depending on which political party you belong to, where in the country you were born, and what you think about the unity of the State. This year will be fifty years since Franco laid the sack, but there are still a good handful of heirs to that regime who haven't washed their togas. Let's look at three very current cases.

When, at the age of 21, Xavier Bosch (Barcelona, ​​​​1967) visited New York City for the first time, the impression was so strong that three decades later he needed to return to write it, but from the point of view of a young aspiring publicist, Edda Leveroni. The girl stars Diagonal Manhattan, I return to the Writer and Journalist's Column after a brief hiatus in Universe. If March 32 (2023) focused on "the dangers of political propaganda" and had previously delved into the lights and shadows of journalism, here "closes the tableau on communication" focusing on its "most luminous branch, advertising." And he does so based on the story of a young woman who makes her way to the United States – and who learns to love – while her father tries to resolve several crises he has at the advertising agency he founded in Barcelona.