Who lives in the Cantabrian knows that idyllic time, sometimes, is only a predecessor of great tragedies.
When the temperature decreases 10 degrees, the wind begins to whip and the sea seems to go crazy, the luck is cast: it is what the gallery is called by the northern area.
In 1912, one of these storms became famous in the streets of Bermeo due to its intensity.
And the news of the anniversary of this tragedy went to the hands of the writer Alaitz Le League 108 years later.
“350 sailors died. I thought that meant 350 widows and orphans. In some way I began to reconsider the impact so great that this tragedy would have had in such small populations and as united with each other,” says Bilbaine to this medium.
So she began to build her third novel, as far as the sea ends (planet).
Lechaga was born in Bilbao in 1982, and never imagined the trip (as she describes itself) that life had reserved for her.
She from Real Estate Agent to Prize Fernando Lara 2021. She passionate about reading and trapped in Victorian era, she began writing short stories that had great reception among the public.
Until an idea became unabarcable in a few chapters and the first book of her came to light: “It was the way to deepen the life of the characters, the destiny that awaits them, the secrets that hide …”.
Two more works came out of that plots, the last winner of the prize granted by the José Manuel Lara Foundation (Sevilla) and the Planeta editorial.
“I am aware of how lucky I am to be able to live from literature, I know it’s very complicated,” he recognizes.
Thanks to this he invests his time to travel through different regions looking for stories and filling infinity of notebooks with schemes and ideas.
For the first time in the trajectory of the writer, the novel of it as far as the sea ends has real coordinates: the coastal town of EA.
“It fascinated me completely that the streets, the beach, the harbor and the bridges were exactly the same as at the time I had planned that the story happened,” she explains when talking about that fishing environment dotted with colorful houses.
And she adds: “When I began to walk through those callecitas, I felt that I was doing it for the same place where the characters were going to do.”
Another theme that attracts Leagaea, as a good Basque, is mythology.
The legends that run the coasts, where superstition and cradle stories are born.
According to her, the figures such as lamias or marine monsters continue very present on the day-to-day of the sailors.
That is why she wanted to gather the twentieth century gallery with a mystery story around the singing of the sirens.
As she herself says: “I wanted to approach Poe. To those stories of suspense without a researcher to use, where the protagonists and their secrets are those who advance history”.
However, all these popular beliefs are the reflection of each society.
The response to disappearances, family traditions, hierarchies, fears … Is magical realism a kind way to make a criticism of the contemporary world?
“I think that in the end all the authors we reflect in some way our own time, wanting or unintentionally, it is inevitable and is the beautiful. It allows you to read a story, dive into the past and understand the present itself,” the writer responds.
His novel addresses current issues such as the aforementioned, although he assures that it is not something aware during the period of creation: “It is a lonely job that makes you live in a bubble. At that time you are alone and the isolation. I begin to ask me those
Issues once the book has been published and the readers give me their opinion. ”
Lecheaga’s only goal is to leave all closed issues: “I think it is essential that when a novel is closed, the public knows the answer of all the frames that have been opened.”
Hence the meticulousness of him when he takes the pencil to fill leaves with frames and layers without leaving loose ends, before throwing himself with the final sketch.
The importance given to the characters sometimes turns them into ghosts.
“There are some who stay with you when you finish writing and it is hard for them,” she says.
For it the magnetic part, both for the writer and to the reader, resides in the hidden faces of each person and the Leit Motiv with whom it is developed.
That is why she is also surprising: “Sometimes you are clear the way, but some protagonist begins to collect importance, changes the rhythm and seizes the scenes.”
Araitz Le Lecaaga has a researcher soul and that has led him to know different areas, atmosphere and people.
“Approach the neighbors, talk … It’s the best part,” she says.
That need to tell what she sees, and add a little fantasy, makes her already submerged in a new project.
She even though she is very discreet about the legend with which she will dream this time: “I can only say that you will like the readers of my previous novels.”