In Praise of Hands

A novel as extraordinary as the life journey of its protagonists, a story in which there is room for adventure, reflection and memory

In 2011, the narrator of this novel and his family arrived, by chance, to a ruinous house located in a small town in the south of Spain. An agreement with the owner would allow them to make use of it while he found financing to build apartments there. It was only a matter of time before the house would be demolished. However, during the following years, they spent long periods in it, repairing it with their own hands, transforming it into a cozy meeting and a place for celebration.

There they welcomed neighbors and friends, with whom they shared food, music, work and laughter. There the family came to live with a dozen chickens, several horses and donkeys, two dogs and a few mice. They never lost sight of the fact that the bulldozers would eventually arrive, which turned the time spent in the house into an eloquent metaphor for life: we give ourselves to it, even knowing that it will end.