The Sinking of the Empire

NOVEL. SEIX BARRAL, 2007. 216 PAGES.

An extraordinary true story: a man from Granada, adventurous and revolutionary as any of his compatriots, finds himself caught up in a risky expedition to rescue Napoleon from exile on Saint Helena.

The author unearthed these real-life events from a dusty archive and managed to piece them back together. Several times, at different locations, idealists and dreamers hatched plans to try to set history back on the right path and free the man who had unleashed a storm of progress upon the world.

This novel, however, is fiction with a thrilling plot and an amazing wealth of historical detail. Constaín, who is not yet thirty but reads the Greek and Latin classics in their original language, has recreated a turbulent period with warmth and precision. A historical novel, an adventure yarn, or whatever you wish to call it, The Sinking of the Empire offers gripping tales, intrigue, sympathetic characters, and the solitary figure of a man confined to a rocky outcrop in the Atlantic.