La fossa

A collection of stories set during the Spanish Civil War, ranging from an account of Republican executions in a Madrid bombarded by Franco's forces and his fascist allies, to an Andalusian marquess who sets out to hunt communists with his personal death squad, to a militia woman who saves the life of a right-wing lawyer out of compassion.

A young man accompanies his mother to a nursing home where he meets don Manuel, a World War II veteran.

"The Anarchist's Wife" is the story of Manuela who is left behind when her husband Justo fights for his ideals against Franco's Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War. He is deported to a concentration camp, and upon his release, continues the fight against nationalism in the French resistance. Years, pass without a word from him, but his wife never gives up hope of seeing him again.

It is the year 1936 and the Spanish Civil War is raging. When the German commander of an international brigade is badly wounded he gives his five comrades a message which he divides up and secretes into in five cartridges. All five shells must reach the battalion in order for the message to be relayed. But Frenchman Pierre can’t bear the heat of the Sierra. When he leaves their hide-out to drink from a well he is hit by an enemy bullet.

A dying man in his forties recalls his childhood, his mother, the war and personal moments that tell of and juxtapose pivotal moments in Soviet history with daily life.

Spain, 1939. In the last days of the Spanish Civil War, the young Carlos arrives at the Santa Lucía orphanage, where he will make friends and enemies as he follows the quiet footsteps of a mysterious presence eager for revenge.

In 1940, in the immediate aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, a young girl living on the Castilian plain is haunted after attending a screening of James Whale's 1931 film Frankenstein and hearing from her sister that the monster is not dead, instead existing as a spirit inhabiting a nearby barn.

Madrid, 1936. Miguel Gila lives peacefully and happily with his grandparents in a humble attic. But the outbreak of the Civil War forces Miguel, along with his friend Pedro, to go to fight. There Gila survives misery, battles, firing squad and jail thanks to his humor. Because of this unique way of interpreting the world around him, Gila will become one of the most popular comedians in Spain and Latin America.

Anxo returns to his home village in the Galician countryside. There, he is greeted with concern by the victorious and the defeated, who see in him the danger of diving back into their silenced memories.

Thirteen-year-old Ramon is on the verge of many adolescent discoveries - and the confusion that goes along with them. Shy and awkward, he's moved from town to town throughout his childhood and believes that life is about winning and losing. But he soon learns it's all about survival. Like Ramon, Spain is in transition (President Francisco Franco is about to die); it's a time of social upheaval marked by change, illusion and struggle.