It was such a tragedy that Chirbes died right after publishing his masterpiece On the Edge and achieving the holy grail of writers everywhere and being translated into English.
I was so sad for his death and heartbroken that I’d never get to read anything else by him.
But then! News got out that a new novel by Chirbes was to be published posthumously. He’d been writing it for 20 years! Completed it days before his death!! The culmination of his life’s work!!! The writer’s last words to his fans of many years!!!!
With shaking hands and bated breath I downloaded the book onto my Kindle and. . .
I could have gone all my life without reading this novel and missed nothing at all. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a decent gay romance novel. I’m guessing that possibly Chirbes was trying to come out by writing it. In 1976 this novel would have been a big deal but today nobody cares who’s gay or not. Chirbes already wrote a novel like this, it was his very first one, and it was just as blah. He’s at his best when he’s most political, and “ooh, look at me, I just said the word ‘gay’, how shocking” is not what he’s good at.
I’m seriously not seeing anything in this novel that needed to be worked on for 20 years.
Clarissa's Blog 
That’s too bad. It’s a bummer when a writer disappoints you like that.
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