When during the last months of the Spanish Civil War the democratic forces retreat towards the French border, taking the path of exile, someone decides to execute a group of Francoist prisoners. Among them is Rafael Sánchez Mazas, founder and ideologist of the Falange, perhaps one of the direct responsible for the civil strife.
Sánchez Mazas not only manages to escape the mass execution, but when they search for him, an anonymous militiaman aims his weapon at him and at the last moment spares his life. His good fortune allows him to live in the forest, protected by some local villagers, although he will always remember that militiaman with the strange look who did not betray him.
The narrator of this strange war adventure is a young journalist trying to reconstruct the historical context of the events and unravel the secret of the enigmatic protagonists. "Soldiers of Salamina" is a publishing phenomenon on a global scale. This book, by a relatively unknown author, won the state award for fiction in Spain in 2001, became the bestseller of the decade, and was hailed as a revelation in Spanish literature.
Today it is being translated into many languages with great success. Not without reason: Therka creates a literary genre by combining historical fiction with reportage, reminiscent of what Truman Capote did with "In Cold Blood." The book tells the story of Spain from 1939, a time of silence, defeat, and uncertainty: its hero - anti-hero - is a far-right ideologist, co-founder of the Falange, with the poetic name Rafael Sánchez Mazas, who, as if by miracle, escaped the execution to which his enemies had condemned him.
The story of "The Rescue of Soldier Mazas" is actually an attempt to rescue the collective consciousness of every people that has experienced civil strife and dictatorship, an attempt to heal the amnesia.
