Juan Gabriel Vásquez
JUAN GABRIEL VÁSQUEZ (b 1973, Colombia) is regarded as one of the most important contemporary Latin American authors.
He has published a number of novels, such as La forma de las ruinas (The Shape of the Ruins) and El ruido de las cosas al caer (The Sound of Things Falling). In The Sound of Things Falling he confronts the violent history of his home country, Colombia, coloured by the drug war between Pablo Escobar’s Medellin cartel and the government.
Vásquez won the prestigious IMPAC prize for El ruido de las cosas al caer. He has written literary essays and translated works by such authors as Joseph Conrad and E M Forster. Vásquez also writes for Colombian newspaper El Espectador, and his books have been translated into such languages as English, Turkish, German, French and Norwegian.
A gripping novel, absorbing right to the end (...) The Sound of Things Falling may be a page turner, but it’s also a deep meditation on fate and death.
EDMUND WHITE, THE NEW YORK TIMES
It is the best work of literary fiction to come my way since 2005 (...) and into the bargain it is immensely entertaining, with twists and turns of plot that yield great satisfaction.
JONATHAN YARDLEY, THE WASHINGTON POST - about The Informers
Memories of violence
Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Edurne Portela.
Evil in literature
Hakan Günday, Helon Habila, Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Gisle Selnes
Listening Post: Günday, Habila and Vásquez
Hakan Günday, Helon Habila, Juan Gabriel Vásquez