Todo eso que tanto nos gusta

Destino, 2008


(Italy, Neri Pozza)


«At the end of Todo eso que tanto nos gusta, I am grateful to Zarraluki that he is now writing with the splendid maturity of someone who dances with measured steps: straight back, classic pose, and on this lips, as if chanting a happy prayer, the memorised steps of the mambo.»
Enrique Vila-Matas, El País

Pedro Zarraluki teaches us what it means to revel in creative, thoughtful idleness and in the chance to reinvent ourselves that lies within all our grasps.»
Calotta Vissani, D La Reppublica delli donne

Skillful, finely-wrought writing. A perfectly weighted, easy-going prose style that leads the reader gently towards the finishing line.»

Giusy Vitolo, Mangialibri

An outstanding novel, written in a state of grace. Tackles life’s big subjects without flinching and in some style.»

Europa Sur

«Marvellously written, this novel also reveals that only those who have the capacity to love are privy to the furious beauty of life. An absolutely happy reader.»
Maruja Torres

«Read this and you'll be able to feel the power of literature, something that should never be lost.»
Félix J. Palma, Mercurio

This novel is the best by Zarraluki. It is so in terms of the craft of the novelist (in the English sense of fictional construction), the written content, which does not lack the essential image, and in its emotional material. It is a novel about simple happiness, so difficult to achieve. And also about the sadness that is incrusted in all truth, as Jules Renan said.»

J. Ernesto Ayala-Dip, El País

Go to your bookshelves and take off all the shelf help books, and replace them with this - you will gain space in the broadest sense of the word. Look, because you will be able to see them (and this says it all) as those flesh and blood characters that make room in their own lives and gain a sparkle of paradise against the past of the future. They enjoy everything that we like so much.»

Ángel Cabo, Qué Leer

«Pedro Zarraluki, inventor and manipulator of stories, juggler, creator of tensions, of funny and honest situations, in the model of exemplary Cervantine novels. The characters of Todo eso que tanto nos gusta are perfectly defined and end up becoming familiar to the reader more because of what happens to them than for what they are, and what interests us is what happens to them. Zarraluki composes an intense and entertaining tale about people who try to escape from tedium and the ghosts of the past in a succession of reconciliations and redemptions.»
J. A. Masoliver Ródenas, La Vanguardia

This novel wins your heart in the same way as the vitalistic and slightly melancholic stories sometimes offered by Italian cinema.»
Cinco Días

«A unique look, rich in detail, full of nuance and suggestiveness, beautifully attentive to spaces and the lives that are sheltered by them, starting from a polished and thorough voice, which attempts to get close to everything and make sense of it all. In this way Zarraluki has created a delicate song to life.»
Ana Rodríguez Fischer, Revista de libros


(Everything we like so much) It’s not always easy to be a father. Neither is it easy to be a son. In fact, nothing is easy in this life...and therein lies the key. Difficulties always end up becoming the heart of the joy of living. An old man escapes in search of an unreachable palace, and his son follows him. In their flight they meet a girl who is sure about love, but she is not sure about committing herself to love forever; a  disturbing woman who lives alone with her Neapolitan butler and cook; a blind man who never wanted to work and ends up growing the most beautiful roses...

Father and son understand that life can be exciting if you know how to see other people, be complicit with them. If you know not to fear the ridiculous, or fear itself. And that , at the end of the day, it is the only chance we have to take a little stroll in paradise. Todo eso que tanto nos gusta is a radiant novel, written with a ease and grace. A novel that tackles the big subjects of existence with natural wisdom and elegant simplicity; Todo eso que tanto nos gusta suggests that the only secret of life is managing to be who we already are... and dancing until dawn.

 -Consigliato dai Librai Arion