The Last Dream

by Pedro Almodóvar

On Sale: 09/24/2024

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The Last Dream

by Pedro Almodóvar

On Sale: 09/24/2024

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Amazon Indigo

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Book Overview
Author Info

AudioFile Magazine Earphones Award

About the Book

A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF 2024

Also available in audio featuring narration by Colman Domingo, Rachel Weisz, and Michael Cera.

“Instantly fascinating, brimming with twisting narratives and unforgettable endings… The Last Dream stands alone as a major literary talent’s virtuosic debut.” —Kaveh Akbar, New York Times bestselling author of Martyr!

Making his English language debut, the iconoclastic, two-time Academy award-winning writer and director reveals his singular mind as never before in this collection of twelve remarkable stories spanning memoir, comedy, autofiction, parody, pastiche, and gothic fiction.

With this debut collection, film legend Pedro Almodóvar delivers a tantalizing glimpse into his world, formed by twelve stories carefully selected from his personal writings dating from the late ‘60s to the present. Almodóvar writes: “I’ve been asked to write my autobiography more than once, and I’ve always refused. . . . I’ve never kept a diary, and whenever I’ve tried, I’ve never made it to page two; in a sense, then, this book represents something of a paradox. It might be best described as a fragmentary autobiography, incomplete and a little enigmatic.”

Each entry reflects Almodóvar's most intimate obsessions, as well as his evolution as an artist. In the title story, “The Last Dream,” Almodóvar reflects on the death of his mother. Other entries in the collection include a love story between Jesus and Barabbas, a story of retribution that formed the basis for the film Bad Education, a manic adventure about a film director searching for painkillers on a bank holiday weekend, and a gothic tale centered around a repentant vampire.

Translated from the Spanish by Frank Wynne

Critical Praise

“Instantly fascinating, brimming with twisting narratives and unforgettable endings… The Last Dream stands alone as a major literary talent’s virtuosic debut.” — Kaveh Akbar, New York Times bestselling author of Martyr!

"Sometimes surreal, sometimes prurient, sometimes discomfiting—and every page worth reading." — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“The celebrated Spanish film director gleefully subverts the sacred as a matter of course. Populated by religious figures, sex workers, pop-culture icons, a gentle vampire, and a man who ages in reverse, these tales, written over five decades, are largely of a piece with Almodóvar’s exuberant, genre-defying cinema.” — New Yorker

“A heady mix of factual and fictitious, befitting of one of cinema’s most imaginative storytellers… [the collection is] bracing, the book serving as an outlet for something Almodóvar can’t express from behind a camera.” — The Observer

“'The Life and Death of Miguel'...could have been written by Roberto Bolaño at his height... It’s fascinating that in fiction Almodóvar prefers to inhabit [a] historical and often fantastical universe. To judge by The Last Dream, he’s akin to a Spanish Angela Carter, or a cousin to the undersung Argentinian genius Silvina Ocampo. What his films and stories have in common is a vivid melodrama; a preoccupation with motherhood, outsiders and religion.” — Telegraph

"The Last Dream is an inspiring testament to one of cinema’s great creative forces. These stories/ allegories/ dreams/ philosophical riffs and intense personal sketches shimmer with all of the vibrance, humor, provocation and humanity of Almodóvar’s entire body of work. A true delight.” — Sam Lipsyte, author of the New York Times bestseller The Ask

"The stories in The Last Dream are like a kaleidoscope that reflects to you only the finest, most unexpected moments. The delicious blend of truth and fiction drops you intimately, with raw honesty, inside Almodóvar’s heart. I love this book!" — Miguel Arteta, director of Beatriz At Dinner

“[A] brisk, eclectic and idiosyncratic tour of [Almodóvar's] memories and imagination... Over the course of 211 pages, the exuberant, coal-haired enfant terrible of Spanish cinema becomes the salt-and-pepper-haired auteur of the late 90s and then, finally, the thoughtful, white-haired sage [of today, these] 12 tales tell a more honest story than would a straightforward memoir." — The Guardian

“The sheer depth and breadth of the collection is astonishing, and it’s made more astonishing by the economy of language. A slim volume of just a dozen stories, The Last Dream is light on embellishment or lengthy description. Almodóvar’s prose is lean but evocative, elegant but grounded, and translator Frank Wynne has done a remarkable job rendering it into stylish, beautifully spare English. Almodóvar’s characters, like those in his films, are full of yearning and wonder. Both for fans of great short fiction and for fans of the director, The Last Dream is a must-read.” — BookPage (starred review)

“A literary treat ... exactly what one would expect from Almodóvar, who gleefully flouts conventions of so-called morality with in-your-face works on homosexuality, religion, and more ... great, cheeky fun ... Devotees of Almodóvar's cinema won't be disappointed by this lively collection.” — Shelf Awareness

“Pedro Almodovar’s first book isn’t a memoir, even though he’s been asked to write one for many years. But it’s like a memoir of the mind, for Almodovar presents everything from childhood memories to short stories to ideas for films to enigmatic passages that might be any or all of these things. It’s typically tantalizing, melodramatic, unexpected and inevitably Almodovarian.” — Parade

"A genre-agnostic spin through the Spanish filmmaker’s favorite preoccupations: doleful divas, Catholic education, rebellion, and the countercultural ferment of Madrid after Franco’s rule." — Vulture