The Lumen Prize for Novel goes to Inma Pelegrín’s dark fable.

The novel Fosca is the winner of the III edition of the Lumen Prize. The work contains “elements of a rural thriller,” is anchored in Spanish tradition, but is a modern novel, emphasized the jury this Tuesday while announcing the decision in Madrid. Its author, the poet Inma Pelegrín (Lorca, 56 years old), adds this award to the distinctions she has received for her poetry (Gerardo Diego Award, Juan Ramón Jiménez Award, Jaén Prize) with her debut in fiction.

This is Pelegrín’s first work of fiction, it has just 100 pages, and will arrive in bookstores on September 25. “A short novel was the best way to say what I wanted to say,” the author explained at the María de Maeztu auditorium at the Ortega Marañón Foundation in Madrid. With a soft tone of voice and a Murcian accent, she expressed her surprise and joy after receiving the sculpture with the letter L, which was presented to her by María Fasce, a writer and literary director of the Lumen, Alfaguara, and Reservoir Books imprints.

At the origin of Fosca, according to the award-winning author, is a medical condition that has marked her life: prosopagnosia or facial blindness, which prevents those affected from remembering faces. “I wanted to write a story about this, and the protagonist, Gabi, has that condition. I also wanted to write about the lives of women who endure very tough work close to the land. Poetry and literature are made with life, Joan Margarit used to say, and this book is not about me, but about what I know.”

In the jury’s statement, composed of bookseller Lola Larumbe and writers Ángeles González Sinde, Elena Medel, and Clara Obligado, Jesús Carrasco and Ana María Matute are mentioned as novelists whose works resonate in the awarded book. Pelegrín highlighted the name of Ana María Matute, whose centenary is celebrated this year, and particularly referred to her book Forgotten King Gudú. “That universe and that way of creating a different world more real than what is real has always fascinated me,” she stated.

Elena Medel added Selva Almada and Agotha Kristoff as authors with whom the novel Fosca engages in conversation. Clara Obligado emphasized that it is an “anti-learning novel,” a modern work in which the great adventure of the story is the language itself. “The homeland of language brings us closer and distances us,” she noted. “Fosca mixes the poetic and popular speech, but it is not a traditional narrative. It speaks of nature, abandonment, and humanity.”

For Lola Larumbe, the bookseller from Alberti in Madrid, Pelegrín’s book shows that “home is not protection in a brief and brilliant work.” For her part, screenwriter, writer, and president of the Reina Sofía Museum board, Ángeles González Sinde, who sent a written statement as she was not present at the press conference, referred to the “reflection on misunderstood masculinity” that Pelegrín’s book proposes.

The Lumen Prize, awarded with 30,000 euros, is dedicated to literature written by women and was created in the nineties by the editor and founder of the imprint, Esther Tusquets, who maintained it for six editions. In 2022, it was resumed by Penguin Random House, the group that now encompasses Lumen, which has recognized Leticia Martin and Natalia Litvinova to date.