Albi

Disgrifiad Cymraeg / Welsh Description

Nofel ingol yn cynnig cipolwg teimladwy a thosturiol ar fywyd Albi, sy'n blentyn yn ystod rhyfel cartref Sbaen yn y 1930au. Mae cyfrinachau'r cyfnod cythryblus hwn yn parhau i'w boenydio yn ei henaint, flynyddoedd wedi terfyn y rhyfel a ffurfiodd genedlaethau o Sbaenwyr.

Disgrifiad Saesneg / English Description

A poignant, compassionate glimpse into the life of Albi, a child caught in Spain in the 1930s, a country at war with itself. The secrets he keeps haunt him until his 88th year, long after the end of a war that has shaped generations of Spaniards.

Dosbarthu

Byddwn yn dosbarthu eitemau sydd mewn stoc o fewn 3 diwrnod gwaith, fel arfer drwy Royal Mail Tracked 48. Ar gyfer archebion o flaen llaw, byddwn yn dosbarthu’r eitem o fewn 3 diwrnod gwaith ar ôl ei derbyn gan ein cyflenwr.

Dispatch

In-stock items will be dispatched within 3 business days, usually by Royal Mail Tracked 48. For pre-orders, we’ll dispatch within 3 business days of receiving the item from our supplier.

Bywgraffiad yr Awdur / Author Biography

Hilary Shepherd grew up in Hertfordshire. After several years in Ghana and the Sudan working for the U.N, she and her husband bought and farmed a small farm in the Welsh borders for twenty years. Since then, Hilary has advised farmers on how to go into organic conversion and worked as a carpenter making windows and staircases and renovating an old house in a beautiful Spanish village. Hilary teaches creative writing workshops and appears at literary festivals.

Adolygiad y Cyhoeddwr / Publisher Review

Hilary Shepherd’s second novel is a tour de force . Set in two time frames, 1938-39 and 2016-2017, in the fictional Spanish village of El Rincón, it draws on considerable research and on the local stories shared with Shepherd over the past twenty years, during which she and her husband have lived partly in a remote village in Spain. The protagonist is the Albi, or Alberto, of the title, who is just nine years old when the story begins in September 1938. The Spanish Civil War has essentially been won by Franco and the Fascists, but the battle goes on, with the resistance fighters, the maquis , scattering around the country to conduct a guerrilla war against the Guardia Civil and attack strategic targets. In its remoteness, El Rincón has been relatively sheltered from the war, though some of its sons have left to join the fight on the Republican side. In September 1938, Franco’s soldiers arrive in the village to protect the dam that lies above it and provides electricity for a neighbouring town. Life in the village has always been tough, with the villagers scraping a meagre subsistence in a harsh environment, but there has been a strong sense of community on which everyone could rely. Now there are the soldiers to feed as well, and to fear. Families are divided and nobody knows who they can trust anymore. Albi is the youngest son of Ramón, who went away to fell trees and returned minus a leg. Was he felling trees or fighting in the war? Whatever the case, he is an angry, bitter man, deeply frustrated by his new disability and the way the war has turned. Manolo, Albi’s older brother, has gone to fight on the Republican side, so it is up to young Albi to do much of the man’s work in the family, which includes tending their small flock of sheep. He is granted a special permit not to attend school and to take the sheep up onto the high Meseta to graze during the day, as long as he is back in the village by curfew. El Ciego, the blind man who runs the flour mill outside the village, spots him as the perfect messenger for the group of maquis who are hiding out up there. Nobody will suspect a boy, and Albi’s permit means he can roam far afield. The rest of the villagers are prisoners in their own homes, living in constant fear of the soldiers hammering on their doors, especially when some of their sons return home, the regresados , and need to be hidden in secret places. Shepherd is a conjurer, drawing the reader into the lives and minds of her characters and sharply depicting the natural and political world around them. You can feel the fear and confusion. You can see the vast open spaces of the Meseta, full of beauty and danger, and you can sense the dark, cramped homes, feel the walls pressing in. And there is the constant, gnawing hunger. As an old man, Alberto lives in a place filled with ghosts, and he is increasingly troubled by his memories and old secrets. He has never talked about the war and the role he played, and the death of his old schoolfriend, Carlos, rattles the skeletons ...