Publishes “Those who do not sleep Nash” (Destino/Columna).
Text: Diego Prado Photo: Carlos Ruiz Bk
I arrived in Pamplona to attend the press presentation of the latest novel by Dolores Redondo and a harsh Navarrese autumn welcomes me to take a chestnut bride, although they have always been traditionally old, since they were born. I think that some good and hardworking witches had those worn-out ashen sidewalks. On the other hand, the witches that appear in the new book by Dolores Redondo, Those who don’t sleep Nash (Destination/Column), are something else. The teacher already said it Torrente Ballester: If there are, there are. But it is not the only thing that appears in this volume of six hundred pages, written with the tension and criminal pulse typical of the author, weapons that have led her to be translated into almost 40 languages and sell five million books. Almost nothing, said a bullfighter.
The delegation that comes from Barcelona is picked up at the Iruña station to go by bus to the town of Elizondocapital of the Baztán Valley, a mythical geography that Redondo has turned into a place of pilgrimage thanks to its famous trilogy. The town, in the heart of the Navarrese Pyrenees and with the headwaters of the Bidasoa bathing it, is 57 km away. In between, hidden mountains, with their scarves of fog, and villages that seem anchored in a past conducive to superstitions and legends of all kinds. Good place to commit a crime, because here everything is known and everything is kept quiet.
From Elizondo, among postcard images, cobbled streets and the eternal hum of the river, you can guess the dark shadow of the Legarrea chasm, one of the settings of the novel, which we plan to visit the next day. Dark, in fact, not so much because of the landscape, full of green ravines and ancient oaks that accompany the path, but because of what happened in its chasm in 1936, where the beautiful Josefa Goñi Sagardia She was thrown while pregnant from a height of 60 meters along with her six children. The case, intertwined with the confusion of the first moments of the military uprising, remained entrenched in the souls and subconscious of the local people. The macabre story grew like a legend, amid silence and shame. But it was not a legend. In 2006 the prestigious forensic anthropologist Paco Etxeberriawho solved the sad Bretón case among others, descended into the devil’s hole with his team and confirmed that that atrocity was true. And also something even more terrible: it had nothing to do with the conflict or ideologies as was initially pointed out, but simply with hatred, envy, religious fanaticism and deceit. The family lived in very humble conditions in Gaztelu. The father and eldest son had been mobilized and that, apparently, saved them. They were viewed with suspicion since they were not natives of the town and never attended church. The mother was accused of practicing strange rituals, curses and other ancestral practices. The fuse of fear, superstition and who knows what neighborhood quarrels just had to light.
Redondo has used this horrifying story to compose his new novel, which given the proximity and emotional involvement of the valley has been painful and difficult. I confess that I went to meet the best-seller San Sebastian born with certain prejudices, but his kindness and closeness overturned them. Six journalists from the afternoon shift sat around her in a small, intimate room in the hotel. Dolores Redondo welcomed us with warmth and friendliness, and had kind words for each of us, something that is not always very common in such well-known and established writers.
For this occasion, Redondo has distanced himself from his researcher Amaya Salazar (although this also appears in the novel) and has created a new creature: Nash Elizondo (a clear nod to the code that forensic experts use to evaluate whether a victim died from natural, accidental, suicide or homicide causes. As for the last name, it is obvious). She is a forensic psychologist who one day finds the body of a young woman who disappeared a few years ago in a chasm with a past of witchcraft legends. “I wanted to offer another different point of view with this new protagonist,” the author tells us, “to escape from the typical police officer or investigator. Nash is a psychologist of the dead and, therefore, has a greater capacity for empathy. She is not looking so much for the police who but for the why..
To write this eighth work, Redondo locked himself up for two winters in Elizondo and it did not take long for him to realize the concern of his neighbors when they found out. The story stirred up too many things. It has not been easy for her either, since she had to work with very sensitive material that included the murder of very young children. Regarding this fragility, Dolores tells us about a family event when she herself had to attend her sister’s birth: “we don’t know how to help birth or help die.”. In this case, the psychologist of the dead tries to investigate not the death, but the life of their deceased patientsa fact that has added the need for greater psychological depth in the novel.
In an aside I ask him about his Spanish literary influences, aware that there is a great weight of oral tradition in his books. he quotes me The watchtowerof Matutethe cruelty present in Benetand finally confesses: «an author who marked me a lot was Ruiz Zafon«. I understand then the good handling that she makes of what, too often disparagingly, we call the folletinesque technique in which the late Catalan author was a master. I point out to her the great presence of gastronomy in her work and that this relates her to Vazquez Montalban. He laughs and jokes: «In any case, he is related to me, because I trained as a chef with Arzak, huh. And he adds: Gastronomy helps me differentiate myself from the novel noir Nodic, in which they only drink and never eat. Furthermore, just like the legends, folklore, etc., I claim the old culinary recipes of the Baztan area, which are equally old.
In these cold valleys, where the nights are very long and superstition and fear can push towards crime or madness, Dolores is a legend in herself: «At the Elizondo police station there is an office in the name of Amaya Salazar. “Reality and fiction are sometimes confused in such a way that I fear one day running into it on the street.”, he jokes.
The night, indeed, is long in Elizondo. Some of us met at the El foosball bar before going to dinner. Dolores, like one more, is added later. I talk to her, now more relaxed. He asks me about my island, he tells me about his childhood summers in Malaga, he is interested in what I write… The next day he will accompany us to Gaztelu, to the climb of the chasm of Legarreain the center of what is known as the Tranquil Valleys, a name he has adopted for his new cycle of four novels (of which Those who do not sleep It is the second after Waiting for the flood). He does not want, however, to take photos there: “For me that place is the scene of a crime.”. I won’t say no. While we walk to the chasm, several companions try to imagine that climb with torches in the middle of the night. It’s hard to believe it because, in broad daylight, it is an idyllic walk and a bucolic place to celebrate a picnic Sunday. Once at the top there is a respectful silence. We look into the chasm (equivalent to 16 floors), covered by the shadow of a monumental and centuries-old beech tree. I then think about what the venerable tree could tell us if it knew.
The book has been everywhere since November 13, my saint’s day. I tell myself that it must be for a reason. Or not. Tired, but with that beatific laxity that comes with a good meal and a pleasant conversation, I slowly allow myself to be overcome by the drowsiness that the clatter of the return train brings, while I ruminate that evil lurks in everyone and that perhaps yes, there are, there are. , although for my part I have not seen a single chestnut tree.
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