Juan Gabriel Vásquez

An influential political cartoonist is paid an unexpected visit by a young woman who upends his sense of personal history and forces him to reevaluate his life, work, and position in the world.

"A new collection of electric, searing stories from award-winning, bestselling author Juan Gabriel Vasquez. The characters in Songs for the Flames are men and women touched by violence -- sometimes directly, sometimes only in passing -- but whose lives are changed forever, consumed by fire, and by unexpected encounters and unyielding forces. A photographer becomes obsessed with the traumatic past that an elegant woman, a fellow guest staying at a...

"A sweeping tale of conspiracy theories, assassinations, and twisted obsessions -- the much anticipated masterpiece from Juan Gabriel Vasquez. The Shape of the Ruins is a masterly story of conspiracy, political obsession, and literary investigation. A man is arrested at a museum in Colombia for attempting to steal the bullet-ridden suit of an assassin. The incident barely makes the news though the political murder this assassin committed years before...

"The Colombian film director, Sergio Cabrera, is in Barcelona for a retrospective of his work. It's a hard time for him: his father, famous actor Fausto Cabrera, has just died; his marriage is in crisis; and his home country has rejected peace agreements that might have ended more than fifty years of war. In the course of a few intense days, as his films are on exhibit, Sergio recalls the events that marked his family's unusual and dramatic lives:...

In 2014, a man is apprehended at a museum in Bogotá trying to steal the suit that an assassinated politician wore on the day of his death. What is behind--and what is the link between--the 1914 attacks against Colombian senator Rafael Uribe Uribe--who would inspire García Márquez to create Aureliano Buendía from One Hundred Years of Solitude, the leader of the Liberal Party Jorge Eliecer Gaitán--whose death in 1948 would blow up the history of...