How I Killed My Father
by Sara Jaramillo Klinkert
Description
Following It Would Be Night in Caracas comes the latest revelation in Latin‐American literature: an astonishing first novel based on true events.
“When I was eleven years old, a hitman killed my father. I was just a young girl, who never thought something like that could happen. But it happened. It still pains me to think that just thirty‐five grams of steel and a gram of gunpowder was enough to end a family. I witnessed it. It ended mine.
However, some thirty years later, here we are: with a dead father and a whole host of questions that nobody’s been able to answer. We’re still afloat, although we’ve been close to shipwreck many times. There’s two less crew members now, because one of my triplet brothers was also killed.
This is the story of my family. To write it, I had to resurrect my father; and so this is also the story of how after his death, I had to kill him again to heal myself: a death impacts those who are left, not those who die. Because burying the body of a father to five children is by no means the end of a tragic story, rather only the beginning. I killed my father so that he could live forever in this book.”
_Sara Jaramillo Klinkert
A stunningly powerful tale in the context of normalized violence in Colombia, and the devastating impacts it carries on the lives of the individuals and families trying to live through such turbulent times.
More Information
Rights Information
Worldwide rights available except French (Editions Stock)
Endorsements
“The tone of the book is at once dry, controlled and moving. It is also sincere, at times absurdly funny, never self‐satisfying and without the slightest inclination towards arousing pity.” – Héctor Abad Faciolince
“Sara’s prose isn’t just precise, rich and efficient; in fact, it’s often breathtaking. As an author, she has an extraordinary control over her language, and a rare capacity to acquire all the hallmarks of literary virtuosity.” – Luisgé Martín
"I had goosebumps when reading certain passages. I was affected by the style, the rhythm of the story and the emotion I encountered on every page. A great narrator with a shining future ahead of her.” – Raphaelle Liebaert, editor of Stock, France
"A tremendous book. I read it with a knot in my stomach, from start to finish. A sweetly painful, elegant and beautiful book.” – Sergio Fajardo.
"The best book from a Columbian author that I have read in the last few months.” – Mauricio Rodríguez.
"Exceptional. [...] I think it is a book that everyone should read.” – Javier Sagarna.
"I read it in one go. Once I started, it was impossible to put down. It´s gorgeous: agile, hard, poetic, liberating.” – Elena Belmonte
Reviews
"The most beautiful novel of this year. [...] An amalgamation of fiction and testimony, which makes you shudder. [...] All this narrated with subtlety in a chain of joys and sorrows, from a happy childhood in a happy country house up to the decision to kill the father and remove him from memory. [...] There is no melodrama nor any massacre. It is written without apostolic frills or elaborations. With curiosity and desire, love and tenderness, brilliance and clarity. [...] Not suitable for those who conceal, repress or distort their emotions. In three words, the most stunning text.” – Esteban Carlos Mejía, The Spectator
"Reading it is equivalent to suffering up to the point that your soul is suffocating. But [...] at some point – in a word, in a scene, in a phrase – all that pain redeems us and a smile appears on our face.” – Mauricio Vargas Linares, The Times
"I read it without stopping. [...] A moving first novel for its tone and the way in which it avoids the well‐trodden path of a history so often recounted.” – Julián Posada, The Columbian
Author Biography
COLOMBIA / Sara Jaramillo Klinkert (Medellín, 1979) is a communications manager and journalist at the UPB. She has worked with many of the main Colombian media outlets. She is a graduate of the Master of Narrative from the Writers’ School in Madrid, in which she was awarded the scholarship for academic performance. This is her first novel, soon to be followed through Lumen by Donde cantan las ballenas (Where the Whales Sing).
Copyright Information
© 2019, Sara Jaramillo Klinkert
© 2020, Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial, S. A. U.
Travessera de Gràcia, 47-49. 08021 Barcelona
PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE GRUPO EDITORIAL
PRH Grupo Editorial is an industry leader in publishing and distribution in the Spanish language. Our objective is the publishing of books for all types of readers, for all ages and across all formats - be it print, digital or audio.
View all titlesBibliographic Information
- Publisher/Imprint Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial / Lumen
- Publication Date June 2020
- Orginal LanguageSpanish
- ISBN/Identifier 9788426409218
- Publication Country or regionSpain
- FormatHardback
- Primary Price 17.90 EUR
- Pages192
- ReadershipGeneral
- Publish StatusPublished
- Original Language TitleCómo maté a mi padre
- Copyright Year2020
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