Paula Vázquez

A moving memoir about motherhood, feminism and books.

Paula attends classes in a ceramics workshop with four other women, who chat and have tea together and mould the clay before firing their creations in the kiln. Not all of them come out well: thirty per cent of the pieces miscarry. At the age of thirty-six, Paula is also trying to get pregnant, but as sometimes happens with her ceramic pieces, she suffers successive miscarriages. Her desire to be a mother surged unexpectedly, after spending her entire youth rebelling against the idea of repeating her mother’s mistakes, who gave up studying to look after her children. But perhaps now that her mother has passed away, Paula can begin to view motherhood from another perspective. Until then, her main concern was to be an independent, traveling woman, self-sufficient and able to cope with anything. And thanks to her love of reading and following an impulse, she has fulfilled her dream of being a bookseller. Far-removed from her life in Argentina, she has opened one of the most genuine and charming bookstores in Barcelona (and another one later in Madrid), whose shelves are only stocked with Latin American books.

Now Paula has just one desire: to be a mother, and one preoccupation: to make room for her child in her feminist life. Perhaps a ceramic goddess, whom she can shape with her own hands, will bless her with the gift of fertility.

‘Her writing is delicate and with a cadence reminiscent of waves that arrive gently but constantly at a shore which, at last, after grief and transformation, becomes the refuge Paula desired to inhabit.’ Victoria Gabaldón, Mamagazine

‘A literary journey through the realms of motherhood, independent bookstores, and feminism, in which she guides us through her own process of transformation and reflection, challenging expectations and celebrating women's free choice.’ Carmen Gómez Moreno, El Generational Post