All the heroes of this story collection—the boy who refuses to follow the family tradition of having his ring finger cut off; the man who cannot escape his house, no matter what he tries; Robin Hood stealing so much from the rich that he ruins the rich and makes the poor wealthy; Gregor the cockroach, who wakes one day to discover he has become a human teenager; the prophet who can’t remember any of the prophecies that have been revealed to him; Ulysses and his minions trapped in the Trojan horse—are faced with a world that is always changing, where time and space move in circles, where language has become meaningless. Their stories are mazes from which they can’t escape. The simultaneously dark, grotesque, and funny Guadalajara reveals Quim Monzó at his acerbic and witty best.
Quim Monzó was born in Barcelona in 1952. He has been awarded the National Award for fiction; the City of Barcelona Award for fiction; the Prudenci Bertrana Award for fiction; the El Temps Award for best novel; the Lletra d'Or Prize; the Catalan Writers' Award; the Maria Àngels Anglada; the Trajectòria; he has also been awarded Serra d'Or magazine's prestigious Critics' Award, four times.
In 2007 he wrote and read the opening speech at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Monzó designed a lecture written as if it was a short story. It differed completely from traditional speeches. Together with Cuca Canals, he wrote the dialogues for Bigas Luna's movie Jamón, jamón. He has also written the musical satire El tango de Don Joan, with Jérôme Savary. He is a regular contributor to the La Vanguardia newspaper.