Last Wednesday 8th of May in Cartagena, Paco Roca (from Comic) and Fernando Lalana (Children and Youth Literature), collected the Mandarache and Hache 2019 Awards at a gala in which they were accompanied by 1,400 students from the almost 6,000 that have participated this year in the reading education project promoted by the Youth Council of the City of Cartagena.
Fernando Lalana won the Hache Prize thanks to his youth novel El comando Gorky, and Paco Roca won the Mandarache Prize for his graphic novel Los surcos del azar. Both works received the most votes from the thousands of young people who, organized in reading committees, make up the massive awards jury, the largest literary jury in the world. In addition to the thousands of young people in Cartagena (Spain), the collaboration of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) and the Spanish Cultural Action (AC / E) facilitated the incorporation of students from two other Cartagenas into the jury, from Colombia and Chile.
During the awards ceremony, full of theatrical performances and video projections, the finalists of the next edition were officially unveiled: Mandarache and Hache 2020. The finalists are selected by the so-called Promoter Group, an assembly composed of voluntary citizens, professionals in the world of education and literature that, in addition to selecting the finalist books of each edition, constitute the organ that directs the project.
