Inés Cardoso Albarracín has been awarded the Puy du Fou Spain Literature Prize for her work La traición de Tenesoya. The competition, in its second edition, received 1,363 manuscripts. The novel explores the conquest of the Canary Islands with a complex protagonist, addressing loyalty, identity, and survival with narrative force.
The selection process: from 1,363 works to one winner 📚
The organization used a hierarchical reading system to manage the volume of manuscripts. First, a pre-selection team filtered the works based on criteria of structure and historical coherence. Then, a specialized jury evaluated narrative tension and character development. Finally, an editorial feasibility analysis was applied, discarding proposals with anachronisms or linear plots. The winner stood out for her balance between documentary rigor and pace.
1,363 works: when writing is cheaper than buying a stamp ✍️
That 1,363 manuscripts were submitted suggests two things: there are many novelists locked up at home, or the prize pays better than a café con leche. The organizers read them all, which probably required more coffee than a computer scientist consumes in a game jam. The winner, at least, proved that having an idea is not enough: you have to prevent the reader from falling asleep in the third chapter.