The virus cannot defeat BCNegra

Barcelona's big date with crime fiction has demonstrated its resilience in this great global battle against covid. This year, all activities have had to be telematics, without an audience, and only a few speakers have attended in person at a set in the Palau de la Virreina. Despite all the restrictions and inconveniences, the festival's commissioner, Carlos Zanón, has managed to pull it off so that it would not miss its appointment in any way and that Barcelona would once again be, during this week, the capital of crime fiction. Zanón has shown in recent editions that he is a more than worthy successor to the beloved Paco Camarasa, with whom I spent such good times in his Negra y Criminal bookstore in Barceloneta rambling about the genre and our common idol Sherlock Holmes.

The pandemic has caused inevitable casualties. For example, that of Elly Griffiths, a British author who entered the Spanish literary market in 2019, although I had already read some of her novels in English. In our country, she has debuted withThe echoes of the swamp, first installment of the adventures of forensic archaeologist Ruth Gallowey, and the second has just appeared,The Threshold of Lying, also set in a British rural landscape. Her absence at BCNegra prevented me from meeting her and chatting with her for a while, as I was able to do last year with another author who has thrilled me in recent times, the DaneMads Peder NordboandArctic Crimes.

In recent times, I have dedicated myself to discovering new scenarios for crime novels. Griffiths does it by combining archaeology and crime. Although she is not the first nor will she be the last author to do so, in her case, I am captivated by the style of this follower of the purest British polar. Nordbo moves the action to an unusual Greenland, where we confirm that this isolated and cold society can generate complex criminal plots not exempt from the violence that Nordic writers have accustomed us to.

Following this line, I am eager to listen on Saturday to one of the novelties of 2021, the Japanese Hideo Yokoyama, who has just published in Spanish Seis Cuatro, a case set in Tokyo that awaits on my nightstand with the expectation generated by good reviews. We will listen to him online along with his friend David Peace, another author residing in Japan. Although without covid, Yokoyama would not have traveled to Barcelona either, as he practically never leaves his house.

They will not be able to sign their latest creations for us, but many other genre references and regulars of the festival have already passed through or will pass through BCNegra this week, even if it is by streaming. To name just a few and forgive the rest: Andreu Martín, Boris Quercia, José Sanclemente, Juan Ramón Biedma, Alicia Giménez Barlett, Claudia Piñeiro and Emma Riverola. And, of course, we have already had the opportunity to listen from New York to Joyce Carol Oates, this year's Pepe Carvalho award winner. Oates is an American writer to whom the jury has awarded the prize for her career and contribution to the crime novel. I confess that I have not read anything of hers, which makes her one of my pending subjects.

The resilient attitude of BCNegra 2021 has been admirable. A week before the program began, pandemic restrictions were tightened, forcing organizers to give up the planned tent on the Rambla that would have allowed some in-person events. The adversities have not prevented all planned events from being adapted to streaming, so none of the panels have been suspended. The international vocation that the event has consolidated in its 16 editions has even been preserved.

The resilient attitude of BCNegra 2021 has been admirable; the international vocation that the event has consolidated in its 16 editions has even been preserved

The history of BCNegra is a history of success and of overcoming difficulties. Few bet at its beginning on the continuity of that initiative led by Camarasa, but here it is, transformed intoone of the benchmark literary events in Barcelona and on the international agenda of the genre.Barcelona and crime fiction have chemistry. Of course, the late Manolo Vázquez Montalbán and his Pepe Carvalho play a key role in this phenomenon, but we must not forget that BCNegra is one more, increasingly important, leg supporting the city's literary and editorial capital status.

Barcelona and books have a long marriage dating back to the 15th century. It would be endless to list the writers, publishers, and events that sustain this capital status: Vargas Llosa, García Márquez, Marsé, Planeta, Barral, Bruguera, Sant Jordi, and even the Sant Antoni flea market are just some of them, but we can go back to Don Quixote, passing through the Renaixença and the boom of creativity in the post-war period and the beginning of democracy. Barcelona has also been the bridge to the Latin American market.

Barcelona and books have a long marriage dating back to the 15th century. It would be endless to list the writers, publishers, and events that sustain this capital status

The sector has endured despite numerous shocks. The latest, the very harsh one of the pandemic, but it is comforting to note that the virus's blow to the publishing industry has been much less than it could have been, according to the editors.The book has become one of the refuges in times of confinement, although the big beneficiaries have been bookstoresonlineThese days, bookstores larger than 400 square meters still remain closed every weekend, as do many other commercial establishments that are being greatly harmed by this health and economic crisis. Visiting bookstores has become a high-risk activity in the opinion of the authorities.

Perhaps, but I find it hard to accept. It's my own resilience.