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The well-known Chilean filmmaker and crime writer Boris Quercia returns to France with his fifth novel, his second science fiction. After his detective Santiago Quiñones trilogy and his dystopian 'Electrocante', he presents 'Les derniers maillons' (Asphalte, 2023), which in Spanish means 'The last links'. It is a ruthless novel in which the protagonist, Victor, has the mission of saving Neuron, a kind of alternative network that will emancipate the society of free men.
Can consciousness be transmitted? Is there consciousness without a body? Does consciousness fit in a little box? Quercia tries to answer these questions in her latest book in which the protagonist, Víctor, is one of the links in the Free People's Society. His mission is to deliver the last copy of Neuron, which is a kind of alternative network for people, the last hope in the face of a fierce world.
A plot in which police operations, intrigue, violence and technology are mixed around Neuron's destiny in a despotic and treasonous society. As if the world that awaits us in the future was merciless.
“I think the world of politics and power is like that. It is also a quite Latin American look. It is a dystopian novel, but I think it has strong Latin American roots. And we have seen how in Latin America all those great libertarian leaders who fight for freedom finally become little monsters who seize power and never let go again. It is this ambivalence of the good and the bad, when the good become bad and become what they hated,” explains Boris Quercia, who was in France promoting the book and participating in such important fiction literature events as the Festival Utopiales, where 100,000 enthusiasts gather every year.
Boris Quercia confesses to us that fiction literature gives him a lot of freedom to criticize. “In science fiction, in some way, one can talk about the present without being so pamphleteer, because it creates an imaginary society. Then, it is more likely that the message will arrive without there being a rejection of it and things can be seen more objectively,” adds the writer.
Although in his previous dystopian novel, 'Electrocante', Quercia invited the reader to take an android on a journey towards human consciousness, in this book he proposes the opposite journey, spreading consciousness through a machine. “It is a nod to immortality, not of the body, but of what makes us human beings, which is consciousness,” she explains.
“At five in the afternoon…”, Quercia's wink to García Lorca
In the story of Neuron there are other nods, apart from that of immortality and Latin American regimes, such as the one the author makes to the Spanish poet Federica García Lorca and her poem “Llanto por Ignacio Sánchez Mejías.” “Five in the afternoon, this is always your time, everything bad happens at five o'clock in the afternoon,” he writes in the novel.
“My mother was a Spanish teacher, she is already retired, she is 93 years old, but she always recited and recites poetry to this day. And García Lorca was one of her favorites. So from a very young age I listened to García Lorca and the musicality of his words is something that always impressed me a lot,” she recalls.
After having dedicated the beginning of his literary career to police detectives with the Santiago Quiñones saga, the Chilean author seems already installed in science fiction literature with this second book. “There has been a very strong escalation of violence in Latin American countries in general. Countries like Ecuador, which were very quiet countries, have been taken over by drug trafficking mafias. In Chile, somehow, violence has also grown a lot. When I started as a police officer, I had to invent a country that was perhaps more violent than it is now,” he acknowledges.
Return to the origins with a film about Roberto Parra
Boris Quercia is not only in the news due to the publication of his novel, he has also just recorded a film about the life of Roberto Parra. A way to return to the origins since he debuted in the musical 'La Negra Ester'. A kind of tribute to this clan made up of Roberto, Violeta, Hilda and Nicanor, who are one of the foundations of Chilean popular culture.
“Roberto Parra is someone very sensitive who through poetry rescues the lives of those who are on the edge of society, from the underworld, the bars, the ports, the brothels in the streets and he is someone who has a drive very strong creation,” he explains.
“Modernity destroys everything and our roots are forgotten. So for me the rescue of his work is super important,” concludes Boris Quercia.
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