Book excerpt: The prize-winning debut novel from a major new talent in Catalan literature—the story of four half-brothers who only discover the others’ existence when the father who abandoned them all is reported missing. Christof, Christophe, Christopher, and Cristòfol are four brothers—sons of the same father and four very different mothers—yet none of them knows of the others’ existence. They live in four different cities: Frankfurt, Paris, London, and Barcelona. Unbeknownst to them, they have one thing in common: Gabriel Delacruz—a truck driver—abandoned them when they were little and they never heard from him again. Then one day, Cristòfol is contacted by the police: his father is officially a missing person. This fact leads him to discover that he has three half-brothers, and the four young men come together for the first time. Two decades have passed since their father last saw any of them. They barely remember what he was like, but they decide to look for him to resolve their doubts. Why did he abandon them? Why do all four have the same name? Did he intend for them to meet? Divided by geography yet united by blood, the “Christophers” set out on a quest that is at once painful, hilarious, and extraordinary. They discover a man who during thirty years of driving was able to escape the darkness of Franco’s Spain and to explore a luminous Europe, a journey that, with the birth of his sons, both opened and broke his heart.