At the time I acquired the novel, Maria gave me her second book, Steve's canotier: Life and Truth (Luminosa Publishing, 2020) as a gift; and after reading it I became the first Spaniard to read her complete bibliography, which filled me with pride and satisfaction.

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Now, Laura Maria has just released her third publication; A Wakefulness of Indocility (Luminosa Publishing, 2021) and she's preparing its film adaptation; and to celebrate these events, her editorial, Luminosa Publishing, decided to publish a 2nd edition of Amnesty, thus celebrating its good reception by the public... and there is yours truly writing the Prologue at the author's request. And since a precious copy with my words written on it has just come into my hands, I wanted to recommend you read it and thus make you part of the work of this woman filmmaker, writer and artist. In Amnesty we are facing a story of overcoming in a dystopian world.

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It tells us about an Earth similar to ours, but different at the same time. The places that you know in our reality do not have the same names here, but you can try to identify them, like El Encanto, which reminds me of Paris. Each place has its rules so, in Costa del Anhelo, the death of a loved one is not mourned, nor is the person buried; and in El Encanto they are buried, though crying is forbidden. Cassandra (the protagonist) meets Raymundo in Costa del Anhelo and they fall in love. Timeo (the antagonist) is out there, waiting for her. When an earthquake destroys Costa del Anhelo, Cassandra flees with Raymundo to El Encanto, but when they get there they are considered immigrants and Raymundo is detained, while Cassandra manages to flee. From then on, Cassandra's life will be linked to that of Timeo, but not for the better. Amnesty talks about migration, about how people feel lost in their own country or in the country they go to try to start a new life.

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It is narrated so beautifully that it seems that you are reading something written in verse or with a melody. And it teaches us a very important life lesson: that we are all inhabitants of the same planet; that we are all MIGRANTS in some way. Among the characters that appear, apart from these three, are Eleonor Lucille, a wretched woman in love with Timeo who seems to come out of a glamour magazine and is devilishly hateful; and Adolphe, a boy very similar to Raymundo who had me suspicious of his 'goodness' the whole novel. And it's curious, because he is a character who is there precisely so that Cassandra trusts him; but I don't, he doesn't sneak in for me. Another great protagonist are the vultures, which unfortunately in our reality are in danger of extinction, but here they are revered. The work teaches us how necessary they are for life on this planet.

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I definitely recommend this novel to you, reader; because of the author's way of writing and because it is not only a novel...

It is also a lesson for life.

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