The flight of the butterfly: David Olivas

The flight of the butterfly is a contemporary novel written by Spanish short film director, photographer and author David Olivas. The work was published in 2020 by the Plaza & Janés publishing house. Upon release, the book has received mixed reviews on Goodreads, where it has 3.90 stars. For its part, on Amazon it has much more positive opinions, with a solid 4.2.

This is one of those stories that generate the same thing as some disruptive people: either you love them, or they never really like you at all.. And it's not that The flight of the butterfly does not break any paradigm, but is written in a way that is unconventional, almost shocking, so that it is easy to understand both extremes within public opinion.

Synopsis of The flight of the butterfly

We have only lost when we stop remembering

The novel It begins when Julia, the protagonist, He is preparing to travel to his family's home after a few exhausting months following the death of his great love. Since the accident that took Carlos away from her, life has never been what it was. His job at the newspaper—a job he had dreamed of his entire existence, and was good at—no longer tastes like anything to him.

With the certainty that she needs to leave behind the house she shared with Carlos, He decides to take advantage of his vacation from the newsroom to return to the place of his childhood., by the sea, where he believes he can heal his wounds. There, he discovers some letters that had been exchanged by his grandparents: Miguel and Candela, who had to separate due to his departure for Germany.

Can love be more powerful than destiny?

Miguel He died before seeing his beloved again, and Candela, now old and sick, cannot remember what really happened. with her husband. This is how Julia takes the initiative to follow the clues that she begins to find in the letters, and embarks on another journey where she could obtain the answers she is looking for, and even those that she did not know she needed to find: the secret of hope.

¿Can a person broken by grief regenerate from a great love, even if it's not yours? At first, all Julia wants is to forget her own pain. Later, she longs to be able to redeem her grandfather and investigate, like a good journalist, the cause of her death. But it is only at the end where she realizes that she has a new chance at happiness, and she follows it without hesitation.

Narrative style of the work

During the first pages of The flight of the butterfly, David Olivas uses a reflective narrative style. Through Julia, its devastated protagonist, she recreates certain images of herself with her deceased husband, while she remembers him, while carrying out her tasks. That is, in principle, the novel is narrated in the experiential present, with some paragraphs in the past.

The book presents several distorted sequences due to the time used by the author, because the title moves between the present, the past and the future in a disorderly way. We might think that this happens because that is how the main character must feel, but it is clear that the mess of time and space is not done on purpose, far from it.

The contradiction of the beloved non-lover

The beginning of the work focuses on describing Julia's sadness, and the way in which she has begun to live without a husband. However, There is a moment between the pages where, unexpectedly, the protagonist narrates a disagreement with her husband. She was waiting for him to celebrate his birthday, and she prepared everything so that the man could have a beautiful moment, but this did not work out.

Julia had bought two tickets for a concert by Carlos's favorite band.. The event would be in Paris, and everything was ready. All that was left was to break the news to the birthday boy. However, the man arrived six hours later, since his co-workers had given him a surprise, taking him out for a few drinks. Thus, Julia was left with a cold dinner and her aching heart.

The other part of the contradiction

The problem is that Carlos did not tell his wife that he would be arriving so late. Furthermore, he also didn't care to know if Julia had anything prepared for him. In any other context, this would not have mattered, but since the subject dies a few pages later, it is not difficult to hold a certain grudge against him throughout the novel, despite the fact that the protagonist describes him as a wonderful man.

In addition to the undesirable relationship between Julia and Carlos, another confusing aspect of The flight of the butterfly It has to do, again, with the times. This time, it is about the actual dates of the events, which do not fit. For example: supposedly, Julia was born in 1979, but she says that her father gave her the movie. Amélie at ten years old, but this film was only released in 2001.

Mediocre documentation or creative licenses?

It may seem like a minor detail, but The entire novel is full of these inconsistencies of verb tenses, dates, Asturian customs and many more. When Candela, Julia's grandmother, receives her at her house, she does it with gazpacho and migas: an event that no Asturian woman, out of mere habit, would have done, much less if her home is near the sea. .

It is these types of details in the narrative that have bothered readers., especially, of course, to the inhabitants of Asturias and other regions of northern Spain. Historical inaccuracy, accompanied by sugary dialogue and an incoherent narrative style, have meant that the substance of the story is appreciated much less than it should. Still, the novel could be entertaining for some.

About the Author

David Olivas was born on October 25, 1996, in Albacete, Castilla La Mancha, Spain. He studies Film Direction at the Rey Juan Carlos University of Madrid. but it was his style of photography that gave him an opportunity in the media such as El País, where he has his own publication. His Instagram profile, @davidolivas, has 53,7 thousand followers.

Likewise, his role as a writer has led him to success with five published titles. His first book has been published five times, and it already has more than 10.000 copies sold.. Likewise, the author has stated that he would love to convert his first work in the genre of the novel in a film, given his ease in writing cinematographic plots.

Other books by David Olivas

• Serendipity (2016);
• The same compass (2017);
• The light that I always gave you (2018);
• The whisper of the angel (2022);
• I see you in heaven (2023)