The writer Isabel Allende won the Planeta Prize, worth one million euros, on October 15, 2026, with "La hora antes del alba", the sequel to "La casa de los espíritus", and she will publish the novel with Grupo Planeta after four decades with Penguin Random House imprints, according to Emol.
The Chilean author, 84, entered the contest, in its 75th edition, under the pseudonym "Luz Ventura" and the working title "Los que faltan". According to Infobae, the prize was presented by the king and queen of Spain at a gala in Barcelona, and the finalist was "La añoranza", by the Valencian author Sergio Hernández. The change of publisher comes just as the prize that carries the publisher's name goes to one of the most widely read authors in Spanish.
For the Spanish-language book industry, and for readers in Mexico, the move matters: Plaza & Janés, the Penguin Random House imprint where Allende had published since 1982, was her home for some 44 years. La Razón describes the result as an editorial shift for the author, who "will now reach readers under Grupo Planeta".
The award is also a sales engine. The Planeta is one of the richest literary prizes in the Spanish language, and most of its winners are published by the same group that convenes it. In this edition, Allende's novel returns to Alba Trueba, Clara's granddaughter, who comes back to the family home after the violence of a dictatorship. Of the character, the writer said: "Alba has been raped and tortured, but they have not been able to break her spirit". The novel arrives more than 40 years after the first installment.
The date of its arrival in Mexican bookstores is still unknown, as is how Allende's work will be arranged on the country's shelves, where her titles have held a fixed place for generations.
This article was written with the assistance of artificial intelligence from verified sources and reviewed by a human editor before publication.
