Lit in Translation

Like a Fading Shadow

Como la sombra que se va

Antonio Muñoz Molina (born 1956)

Translated by Camilo A. Ramirez

English editions

In English

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After shooting Martin Luther King on 4 April 1968, James Earl Ray goes into hiding and spends ten days in Lisbon, chasing a visa to Angola. Using FBI files only recently made public, the narrator pieces together the murder, the flight and the arrest. The Portuguese capital ties three trips together: the fugitive's; a young Antonio's in 1987, hunting for the book that would launch his career; and the present-day writer's, as he tries to grasp both strangers. Memory, chance, identity and the act of writing run through it.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form
Novel
Length
531 pages in the original
Genres
Crime, Autofiction (assigned by AI)
Set in
Portugal, 1968, 1987
First published
2014 by Seix Barral
Author's age
58 when first published
ISBN

9788432224157 (original)

9781781258934 (Tuskar Rock Press, United Kingdom)

9781250182432 (Picador, United States)

9781781258941 (Serpent's Tail, United Kingdom)

More
Wikidata