NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS

Halfon´s novel Cancion is a biographical and historical short novel about the author´s Jewish-lebaneses immigrant family and their lives in Guatemala. The novel addresses relevant issues in current discussion about Jewish diaspora, migration and the armed conflict in Guatemala. All of these short biographical and historical vignettes are tied to a reflextion on the identity of a writer as descendant of a migrant. The novel allow us to know about the history of the conflict in Guatemala and how those who were once migrants, now naturalized, become exiles due to the conflict. and geographic ancestries. The main character of the novel parodies the author by introducing himself as a Lebanese writer at a meeting of writers when his Lebanese connection is filial but not territorial, linguistic or political. Another aspect is how the identities of exiles and migrants are constructed in the diaspora when they have a repertoire of religious, ethnic. The writing is captivating, the characters memorables, the historical scenes evocative and the overall reading experience enoyable. For all these reasons, we consider it an excelente candidate for the Dublin Literary Award. Halfon´s works and awards