Writer Almudena Grandes dies at 61

Almudena Grandes has died at 61 as a consequence of cancer.

The writer, one of the best known in Spanish literature, has died just a month after confessing in one of his columns that he suffered from this disease since a year ago.

“It all started a little over a year ago. Routine checkup, malignant tumor, good prognosis and fight (…) Among all the characters that exist, my favorites are the survivors, and I am not going to disappoint myself, much less my own protagonists, “he wrote then in a column for ‘El País’.

In this same article, the author of ‘The ages of Lulu’ announced that she was writing a novel, something that kept her “whole” and to which she wanted to dedicate her time. “Perhaps it will reappear with hair, perhaps without hair, with a curly mane or with the hairstyle of my dear Josefina Báquer, as my grandmother called her. But I solemnly promise that I will sit in a booth again to sign copies and look into the eyes of my readers, from my readers, “he added.

Grandes was consolidated as one of the most important figures in Spanish literature for ‘Las Ages de Lulú’, his first novel. This was a great success among critics, being translated into more than 20 languages ​​and brought to the big screen by Bigas Luna. A few years later he published ‘Malena es un nombre de tango’, which reached the cinema thanks to Gerardo Herrero.

In the following years he wrote ‘Atlas of human geography’ or ‘The difficult airs’, which also ended up on the big screen thanks to Gerardo Herrero. In 2007, he published ‘The frozen heart’, which earned him the José Manuel Lara Foundation Award and the Madrid Booksellers Guild Award.

‘Inés y la feliz’ led him to win the Critics’ Prize, the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Prize and the Elena Poniatowska Ibero-American Novel Prize. Subsequently, she was awarded the Atocha Lawyers Award, the Liber Award and the National Narrative Award.