This was the presentation of 'The Whisper of Fire' with Javier Castillo at the SUR Culture Classroom

"We all burn inside wishing to wake up," wrote Javier Castillo on his social media a few hours ago. A powerful and enigmatic phrase that will make sense ... today, when many begin to devour the pages of 'The Whisper of Fire' (Suma). Javier Castillo returns to bookstores this Wednesday with his eighth suspense novel, but the first set in Spain, in the Canary Islands. A return that, as is tradition, he will also celebrate at home. The writer from Malaga presents and signs copies of his new book this afternoon at the SUR Culture Classroom, in a meeting with journalist Paco Griñán at the Cine Albéniz. The event is sponsored by the Unicaja Foundation and Victoria Beers.

Related News

Nativel Preciado, Aitor Sánchez and Javier Gomá, upcoming guests at the SUR Culture Classroom

The phenomenon of the thriller in Spanish, with 2.5 million books sold, assures that this is his "most emotional and transcendental" book. It deals with life, death, love, pain, loss, family... "And, above all, there is a hidden message at the bottom: that inner flame that we all have," he adds. A fire "that roars beneath" us and that justifies the setting of the plot in the volcanic Canary Islands. Mario and Laura Ardoz, twin siblings, visit the islands: he has just received his last chemotherapy session; she believes this trip is the best way to start over after cancer. But Mario suffers a relapse that keeps him hospitalized for a couple of days. Upon his discharge, he discovers that his sister has disappeared and her mobile phone locates her in a desolate landscape scorched by lava. Thus begins a race against time and a struggle with the fire that seems to open under their feet.

Sets the plot in the volcanic Canary Islands, as a metaphor for that "inner flame we all have"

"The novel seeks to become that small flame that enlivens people's lives," declares the bestselling author. Because, beyond containing a great mystery, with the classic twists of the thriller, in this book "what matters is not so much solving what happens, but what happens inside you as you read it."

Accustomed to setting his stories in New York, Castillo now completely changes the setting. He acknowledges that he had been wanting to bring the plot closer to Spain for a while, but needed to find something that would give a global sense to everything. And an event he experienced in the Canary Islands sparked the idea. On a family trip, during a visit to the hermitage of San Telmo in Tenerife, a boy fainted from a sugar drop and his partner, and everyone around, rushed to help him. That anecdote made him think about how someone can have a dream and many plans for a trip "and suddenly everything changes and you realize that everything is much more ephemeral than it seems."

'The Whisper of Fire' arrives in bookstores just before another of his stories premieres on the small screen. Following the huge success of the adaptation of 'The Snow Girl' - filmed in Malaga - on November 14, Netflix releases 'The Crystal Cuckoo', the series of his sixth novel that moves the original action from New York to Madrid and from Steelville (Missouri) to the town of Hervás in Cáceres. He will discuss all this and more in a close encounter with journalist Paco Griñán, who has closely followed his career since his beginnings in literature. The appointment: October 8, at 6:30 p.m., at the Cine Albéniz.