The Valencia Book Fair has started with an intense program that includes more than 1,300 activities including book presentations, book signings, family and children’s activities, storytelling and musical performances. According to the director of the Fair, Manolo Gil, more than 500,000 people are expected to visit a competition that, among other things, incorporates activities to celebrate the centenary of the poet Vicent Andrés Estellés and even a space that has been called “Espai Estellés”.
The Fair runs until May 5 with 82 exhibitors who will occupy nearly 120 booths. On Friday afternoon, a large audience attended the presentations and signings of Sara Torres with her novel ‘The Seduction’, Bob Pop and his praise of “drunkenness well understood” in ‘Como las Grecas’ or Jesús Carrasco, novel prize Seix Barral, for his latest work ‘Praise of the Hands’.
Before more than 300 people, Sara Torres presented ‘The Seduction’, accompanied by the poet Àngels Gregori, a lesbian love story between two people with “a noticeable difference” in age. Torres celebrated “being able to leave the meme and virtuality and meet in person before a young and dedicated audience that enjoys these spaces that reconcile and remind you why you dedicate yourself to writing.”
The television and SER collaborator ‘Bob Pop’ held a meeting with his readers, accompanied by the professor of the University of Valencia, Fernando Flores, in which he defended the “enjoyment of drinking socially” which is the ‘leitmotif’ of his book ‘Como las Grecas’. The author believes that drinking with friends allows “the creation of a virtuous circle that connects, brings together and makes the world more bearable.” “It is not a plea in favor of alcoholism, but the simple answer to the question of why I drink.”
The visitors also had the opportunity to meet the authors of the essay on football ‘Sobretot que perda el Madrid’, Toni Mollà and Joan-Carles Martí, attend the presentation of the book by former president of the Generalitat Ximo Puig, ‘Una Idea d’Esperança ‘, or learn about María Villamayor’s first work after the success of ‘The Twelve Keys’.
The current ambassador of Spain to the OECD, Ximo Puig, assured that it is “very special to return as a writer to the Fira del Llibre de València, one of the most extraordinary in Spain and Europe”, and claimed respect for “diversity as legacy of both the Botànic and the central axis of his book”. He defined ‘Una Idea d’Esperança’, edited by Tirant Lo Blanch, as “a letter of urgency after the elections to express the bases and principles of the ideas of the Botànic government, beyond concrete actions.”
There were also queues to get the dedication of the Seix Barral Prize, Jesús Carrasco; the ‘chronicler’ of ancient Rome, Santiago Posteguillo; the comic artist Paco Roca or Manuela Ortega and their secret memoirs, ‘Taking a Party, History of a Commitment’.
Yesterday also took place the presentation of the first poems of Vicent Andrés Estellés, collected in ‘Oil Calent del Gresol de la Vida’ and prefaced by Josep Ballester, who concluded with a musical recital of ‘Primera Soledad’, his only book of poetry in Spanish, edited by the Alfons el Magnànim Institution of the Diputación de Valencia.