The voice notes of Sofia, a high school student, and her exchanges with Luna on Instagram take the reader into the life of this adolescent whose affective mainstays are her biologist grandmother Estrella, and her mother Blanca, an emergency physician. Sofia reveals her thoughts and concerns in a world beset by negativity, hate speech, and also the distress of everyday life under the dark shadow of school bullying. Her exchanges also disclose the secret shared by Blanca and Estrella. Discovering this will distance Sofia from her mother when she most needs her. With her skilful, vivid re-creation of young people’s lives, Isabel Alba has created a novel that is richly structured in voices and emotions.

With a degree in Philosophy from the Complutense University in Madrid, Isabel Alba is a photographer, screenwriter, and novelist who now resides in Donostia. She has published two essays on film narrative and five novels, Baby spot (2003), La verdadera historia de Matías Bran. El recinto Weiser (The True Story of Matías Bran: The Weiser Property, 2011)—which was a finalist in the Euskadi Prize for Literature—, 65 % agua (65 % Water, 2014), La danza del sol (Sun Dance, 2018), La ventana (The Window, 2022) y Tortugas (Tortoises, 2024).