The vile garrote is in many cases associated with the Inquisition, but the last execution through this procedure in Spain, the execution of Salvador Puig Antich, took place on March 2, 1974. to his skill and strength: an instant death or a long and painful death. Pepe Isbert’s phrase about the inhumanity of this system in Luis García Berlanga’s El verdugo (1964) still echoes in the popular imagination: “If there is a punishment, someone must apply it.” But what happens when a person decides, at his own risk, what is right and wrong, and decides to practice justice? What is morally reprehensible? And above all, who should punish him? At a political moment when they are trying to eliminate criminal classifications that take too long to define, Toni Hill’s (Barcelona, 1966) latest novel, The Last Executioner, reaches a fundamental relevance.
After the discovery of three carefully crafted bodies, each in a different station, the police know there will be a new body to analyze every three months. The note found next to the bodies (“someone has to do this”) makes it clear that he is a serial killer, so he decides to enlist Lena Mayoral, a criminologist, to help read the psychological traces left by the criminal.
There are already a number of elements that are part of the distinctive features of Hill’s literature. The first is social blame as one of its main features, of which the reader hardly realizes. The choice of particular heroes in their fiction is basically a clear political position; Therefore, the number of homosexual characters in this novel is comparable to that of heterosexuals, and there are homoparent families as well.
Secondly, the chorus of his works. We never have a single clear protagonist: Hill always builds a universe of voices, characters, and relationships. And one of the keys to doing this job as well as it is is the writer’s ability to draw their personalities. This feature is decisive in a conspiracy in which victims, suspects, and investigators constantly vie for leadership. All are equally relevant, and the alternation of their transcendence places them on the same level. It’s a difficult thing to achieve.
Finally, secrets as the engine of their intrigue; We are presented with a set of elements that only some heroes know, and that serve as a bargaining chip for forging deals and hostilities. Everyone seems to have something to hide in this novel. And it is very important that the reader is always one step ahead and knows much more than the characters so that the tension does not decrease.
We are facing one of the best national thrillers of recent years. The key lies in a clever plot, well-structured characters, and a solid desire to entertain as a reading engine. And it promises to be one of the books we’ll see on all sunbeds this summer.