Ten of the best novels set in Spain

Stephen Burgen writes for The Guardian and Observer. He is a translator from Spanish & Catalan.

One title on his list of ten of the best novels set in Spain:

Homeland by Fernando Aramburu

If a better Spanish novel than Homeland has appeared in the past 10 years, I’d like to hear about it. Set in a fictitious village near San Sebastián, it’s the story of two families and, above all, two women: one whose son is serving a long jail sentence for a killing he carried out as a member of the Basque terror group Eta, and the other whose husband was murdered by the group. It is a story of personal and tribal loyalty, of oppression by the state and by Eta, and ultimately of people trapped in a story from which they can’t escape. And yet, in spite of that and the constant rain, it is an uplifting tale, beautifully crafted and full of feeling.

Read about the other entries on the list at the Guardian.

--Marshal Zeringue