Juan Cruz Ruiz’s latest work, set in Puerto de la Cruz, Tenerife, draws readers into a quiet sanctuary of memory. In a journey spanning twelve hundred steps, he revisits his roots and stands on the threshold between childhood and adolescence. The trek marks the distance between the narrator and the family home, where friendships are recalled and mistakes are examined. Life belongs to him and to the reader alike.
Do we ever stop being the child we once were?
Not really. We keep dreaming because there is always a sense of something lost. We were youngsters who carried a piece of the past with us, a piece that remains even as time moves on.
The novel explores childhood and adolescence. Does our path from school echo the journey described by Max Aub about origins and destination?
The author reflects that his high school years felt unusual. It was during those years that journalism caught his attention, pulling him away from books during class, yet drawing him toward a world he would enter as a practice. He began his engagement with journalism at the age of thirteen.
He once helped found a major newspaper and later held a leadership role in a prominent media group.
At thirteen, a first spark of love emerged—toward people, and toward journalism itself. Love can fade, but a call toward the craft persists. He remains deeply in love with journalism.
Does memory carry a kind of blood?
Yes. It is striking to recall a moment when his mother faced mortality, a memory sparked by a dramatic event at home. These are the memories he plans to share someday, though many he still keeps private.
There is a notable amount of blood in the novel, isn’t there?
Indeed, there is.
Why so many memories?
Because there was a lot of suffering. A relative once sought to harm his father, and the danger lingered in daily life. The ordinary acts of life reveal themselves through memory, both painful and ordinary.
Is the line about time as a tangible and stubborn thing accurate?
Memory travels with a person and resists leaving. It takes shape through words that surface when needed, like forgotten toys coming back to mind.
In another moment, the author notes that childhood fears are never fully cured.
Fear resides as a physical sensation, especially in the chest. The word itself carries a history and a living presence, a reminder of childhood and body alike.
Do we become more cowardly with age?
Perhaps we are closer to the exit, which makes caution seem more natural as years pass.
How is fear kept at bay?
By singing. The author recalls how, as a slender child, he used song to bring people into his life and home. He could be sad or quiet, and when a call came, he faced it as if it belonged to him alone.
Was this one of the hardest novels to write?
The process varied. He wrote quickly at first and then revised, letting the scenes unfold as if he were watching them come to life on the page. Everything centers on the neighborhood, the children, their clothes, the school, the teachers, and even the small acts that illuminate daily work. He has lived those scenes; they were not inventions. At times, he wrote in a Tenerife basement, where the childhood voice spoke through the typewriter, and he felt as though he had not grown old with the years but remained inside that story.
Why not tell the story twenty years earlier?
Because life kept him moving forward. When a loved one passes, the world shifts into a different rhythm. The book is dedicated to a lifelong friend, and memory itself becomes fragile when not preserved. The voices who filled gaps in the narrative were those who were present in the author’s life.
In a discussion with a literary supplement, he recalled a sharp and uncompromising writer. Have we become more rigid with time?
Thinking that memory should be muted betrays a society that fears memory’s power.
Is memory simply experience?
Memory is what you recall from experience. Experience can fade, but memory acts as a check against oblivion, warning of what lies ahead. Without memory, an abyss opens up; the bad moments are often forgotten, while the good ones endure.
Does the last chapter weave together childhood, adolescence, and rumor?
The rumor in the neighborhood sits at the center of the tale. It reflects conditions in poorer areas where doubt and blame run high. People once whispered to please those in power and betrayed those who did not. A harsh chapter of history shows itself in the way a wall could separate and humiliate. The present president of Madrid comments on women in a way that echoes the old insult, which is unimaginable in its continued presence. Insults remain insults.
And finally, a tribute to Lorca.
The author recalls finishing the book after reading a Lorca quote during its Madrid promotion with another writer. The lines spoken in that moment resonated deeply, becoming part of the narrator’s own words. The memory of those lines travels with the narrative, shaping what remains and what will be said in the future. He hopes to reach the end of this journey, to make sense of the voyage and to keep moving forward, with a wish for growth and understanding.
He calls himself a poet.
Yes, and journalism remains a second, essential vocation—a stable presence alongside poetry.
In a documentary about Brines by Rosana Pastor, the author reflects on leaving Madrid and feeling emptier for it.
The emptiness showed a growing space that needed to be filled, and Brines helped to fill it with a rare courtesy. His presence could feel almost intimate, a quiet, if mischievous, companionship shared during late-night conversations over meals.
What about the circle of writers who surrounded him?
It was a circle of warmth and curiosity. He grew fond of how others dressed, the fabrics that covered them, and the shared memory of tactics that had never quite been ours. He never envied their success, only the possibilities they opened up for him.
What about literature itself?
Books hold a fierce appeal; jealousy has no place where good writing sits. The author often travels with works he admires, letting their influence mingle with his own craft.
Any examples?
Today he carries with him a book by the celebrated Tomás Eloy Martínez, and among his notes is a description of a visit to Saint Tropez on the Côte d’Azur. A paragraph from that book moved him to share a thought on journalism, noting that journalism and literature are entwined in a way that truth cannot be invented—it can only be reported.
Do some people still love journalism yet boast they never read newspapers?
That stance is untenable. Reading remains essential. Yet there are moments when stepping back from journalism is necessary to see what is truly happening behind the headlines. The craft, after all, deserves a more restrained, thoughtful approach.
Perhaps the piece reads well in pages of culture and sport.
The final assessments of the press’s role reveal a truth often missing: what is not said matters just as much as what is said. We learn to listen for silence in the noise.
What happens to the numbers around the twelve hundred paces and the five thousand eight hundred two?
Numbers were a childhood friend, a basic tool that helps make sense of the world. They stay with the speaker, a reminder that curiosity begins with counting.
Does eternity begin on Mondays?
The phrase comes from a poem and a later book that plays with time. Mondays are not favored days, and the speaker notes that some things, like asthma and the return to school, have long cast a shadow on those days. Still, the journey persists, always moving toward some new understanding.