In September 1977, Sandra Mozarowsky—a seventeen-year-old Spanish erotic film actress and purported lover of then King Juan Carlos I—died after leaping from her fourth-floor balcony in Madrid. The mysterious circumstances surrounding her death drew immediate public interest and generated conspiracy theories. Was her death a suicide? A covert murder? A cry for help? In The Shy Assassin, award-winning Spanish novelist Clara Usón uses the tragic death of Mozarowsky to provide a powerful philosophical meditation on suicide and turbulent years of the Spanish transition to democracy. Playfully drawing upon the work of philosophers like Ludwig Wittgenstein and Jean-Paul Sartre, Usón weaves together her own experiences as a rebellious teenager with those of Mozarowsky’s with great power and emotion. Winner of the prestigious Sor Juana Inés de La Cruz Prize, Usón’s novel is a funny, provocative, and deeply entertaining look at Spanish culture during a time of historic cultural and political change.

Clara Usón is a novelist who lives in Barcelona. In 2018, she won the prestigious Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Prize for El asesino tímido.

Lily Meyer is a translator, critic, and author of the novel Short War.