Open Road

A fascinating look into the elegant and turbulent Barcelona of the 1920s, and a historical detective novel—based on real events and characters—that unravels an intricate web of political intrigue and chronicles the end of a dazzling era

In the early 1920s, Barcelona is on the verge of boiling over. Pablo Vilar, a well-connected young lawyer and journalist, meets several mysterious people who seem to hold clues to what is brewing in the city. The diverse cast of characters includes an assaulted cabaret artist, an anarchist leader, the city’s new, autocratic civil governor, and a beautiful, wealthy countess—their destinies all bound by invisible ties.

While the city both touches its zenith and peers into the abyss, Vilar guides us through a labyrinth that leads from the caverns of Montjuïc, home to paupers and outlaws, to the high-society parties in the gardens of Horta. Based on documents from the author’s family archives, A Barcelona Heiress provides a fresh perspective on a complex and dramatic period.

Barcelona, 1920, at a critical time during the reign of Alfonso XIII, king of Spain. Political violence has seized the city and anarchist bombs explode daily. Pablo Vilar is a young lawyer with a literary vocation, who publishes his articles in a city newspaper. Catholic, monarchist, and well-connected in aristocratic circles, he attends receptions, dinners, and parties. He rubs shoulders with politicians and military leaders, and maintains a romantic friendship with Isabel Enrich—an inquisitive, intelligent, and very independent young heiress.

But Pablo’s life is turned upside down when he meets the singer María Nilo, a mysterious woman who puts him in contact with the anarchist Ángel Lacalle. In Ángel’s hands, Pablo discovers the caves of Montjuïc where the dispossessed live in terrible conditions, the reverse of the Barcelona in which he moves. Pablo escapes an attack, investigates a disappearance, mixes with a hard-line civil governor, and visits libertarian anarchist communities with their new views on society and justice.

The Barcelona of the 1920s, marked by violence and, at the same time, an intense vitality, is a fascinating city. A Barcelona Heiress, inspired by real events and characters, and by documents in my family archives, recreates the elegant surroundings of a world on the verge of disappearing, along with the hustle of cabarets and newsrooms, and the bustle of the courts where justice is handed out—or delayed—during those turbulent years.

ALTERNATE TITLES

It seemed important to me that the title allude to both the principal female character and gave the key to the city where the action happens. It also has a certain flavor of the Nick Carter detective novels, which the protagonist likes to read.

Characters

Pablo Vilar. Narrator and protagonist. A young lawyer and journalist, with firm Christian and monarchical convictions. Well connected with Barcelona’s high society of the 1920s, and serves as public defender in court.

Isabel Enrich, Countess of Mayans. Beautiful and wealthy, heiress to a family fortune, she is an independent woman, with social and cultural concerns that lead her to explore the most diverse environments.

Ángel Lacalle. Leader of the most moderate branch of the Catalan anarchist movement. He is opposed to the violent action that some of his peers propose.

María Nilo. Actress and singer who performs in a cabaret in the Barcelona port neighborhood. She is mysteriously attacked by some supposed admirers.

General López Ballesteros. Military leader with a reputation for being tough. Seasoned in colonial wars, he was sent to Barcelona by the Spanish government to restore order in the Catalan capital, which is becoming engulfed in a spiral of political violence.

Libertad. Young anarchist from the Community of the Sun, whose members embrace a peaceful philosophy, Esperanto, and nudism.

Count of Güell. A patron of the arts and member of one of the city’s great patrician families, which has funded major buildings by Gaudí.

Joan Amic, “Amichatis.” Journalist and bohemian writer, he is the author of the lyrics of the Cocaine Tango which is sung in the Alcázar Español cabaret.

Having published several nonfiction books on cultural themes, I wanted a change of register. I come from a family of journalists. The first, my grandfather Pablo, also made his name as a criminal lawyer, monarchic activist, and personal secretary to the Spanish prime minister Eduardo Dato. At the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he survived because an anarchist, who he had defended for free years before, went to his house to warn him that they were looking for him. After a long life with some ups and downs, he died in 1982. I found that I actually knew very little about him.

I decided to investigate his life story and for a year and a half immersed myself in my family archives, and collections of newspapers on which he worked. I found a lot of material. And I thought it was the starting point for a narrative treatment of his character, novelizing it, which to me presented a more attractive challenge than a conventional biography.

The papers of my grandfather and some Catalan patrician families have enabled me to tackle the so-called gun-law years (1919–1923) from the point of view of the monarchist circles that formed the court of Alfonso XIII in Barcelona. A vanished world, glamorous and violent, of great contrasts. The result is A Barcelona Heiress, part historical thriller, part family saga, and, in any event, a tribute to an era at once terrible and fascinating.