Maria Climent

Amposta Prize 2019

Gina discovers life is serious suddenly and without warning. She still hasn’t left behind her adolescence and adulthood, with all its commitments, seems faraway. But one morning she wakes up with a strange sensation in her body and, after months of tests, she is shocked by a serious and unexpected medical diagnosis.

This is the starting point of Gina, a funny, tender novel, bursting with charm, which narrates in first person the tribulations of this unconventional thirty-year-old woman who tells us about her life as if whispering an exciting secret in our ears.

Gina's voice is intelligent, warm and amusing, uncomplicated, direct and very authentic. She speaks to us of love and sex, unbreakable friendships, illness and pain, the desperate desire to be a mother, people with whom she crosses paths, the why and wherefore of things and the meaning of life.

“Through her main character, Climent travels a path that challenges her to assume the limitations of her body, until she finds truth and happiness.” Andrea Aguilar, El País

“A very unusual voice and viewpoint that transforms narrative into knowledge. [...] The chronicle of an experience of growing up [...] with a peculiar bias, humorous and ironic, at times tinged with black and bordering on hopeless comedy.” Ana Rodríguez Fischer, El País

“A novel without a recipe, very naturally experienced and written. [...] One has the impression that the book was written by a mocking blackbird: a hyperactive bird with dark plumage. Solitary, it likes going to places where there are people. This contact with humans makes it laugh a little at everything. A remarkable first novel.” Julià Guillamon, La Vanguardia

“Climent's merit lies in her tragicomic way of facing the other side of joy, in the fluidity of her unerring gaze with respect to her circumstances, and in her ingenious use of comedy to stifle any sign of melancholy.”  Ponç Puigdevall, El País

“A wonderful, fantastic novel. A lesson on the loss of fear. I loved it. It contains huge lessons on fear, sadness and anguish. And it also talks about motherhood, medicine and us.” Bob Pop, A Vivir Madrid (Cadena Ser)

“In 153 pages, Maria Climent . . . relieves pain and precariousness with songs from the Pixies.” Charo Lagares, Marie Claire

“A powerful story that awakens wonderful feelings in the reader. [...] Brief but immense. [...] In just over one hundred and fifty pages she manages to create something magical, striking and intensely emotional.” Blai Garrigues, Negra y Mortal

French Press: 

"Une écriture sincère et drôle, une vraie intelligence de vie, c’est une lecture tonique." Anne Kiesel, Le Matricule des Anges

"Un portrait précis oscillant entre impressionnisme et hyper-réalisme. On se retrouve dans ces lignes, on éclate de rire franchement à certains moments savoureux et jubilatoires, on se fige à la lecture de certaines pensées intimes et manifestement universelles. (...) Une mise à nu courageuse et frémissante." Blog Résonances Littérraires