Carlos Andrés Tromben Reyes (born 23 July 1966) is a
Chilean journalist and writer.
In 2021, he refused to run for a seat in the
Constitutional Convention Constitutional convention may refer to:
* Constitutional convention (political custom), an informal and uncodified procedural agreement
*Constitutional convention (political meeting), a meeting of delegates to adopt a new constitution or revise an e ...
. However, he has defended the key proposals of the Convention.
Biography
Son of the ship captain and naval historian, Carlos Tromben Corbalán, and Gloria Reyes Ojeda, Tromben studied at the French College of
Vina del Mar, currently, the French Alliance, which in those years was close to the
Quinta Vergara
Quinta Vergara is a park located in Viña del Mar, Chile. The park features three major landmarks: the Palacio Vergara, the Quinta Vergara Amphitheater and a garden. Every year the park is home to the Viña del Mar International Song Festival.
P ...
. Then he finished his
BA and received as a business administrator at the
Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso (PUCV).
Similarly, he studied journalism and communication at the Higher School of Commerce in Paris (2001–2002).
Tromben made his debut in literature in 2003, when he won the
El Mercurio Book Magazine contest with his first novel, Poderes Fácticos, a police novel based on a real event: the double homicide of a painter and his partner that occurred in April 1973 in an apartment on Rosal Street. It was followed, two years later, by another crime novel, ''Prácticas Rituales'' (''Ritual Practices''), and in 2006, Karma, a complex novel that was well received by critics and about which
Camilo Marks said that he didn't consider it as his favorite 'fiction novel, but also one of the most entertaining, ambitious, visionary works published in Chile in recent times'.
After ''La Casa de Electra'' (2010) —a spy thriller set during
World War II with a woman as the protagonist—, in 2015, Tromben published ''Huáscar'', a historical novel that describes the capture of the legendary Peruvian monitor.
This work, also commented by the National History Prize
Eduardo Cavieres
Eduardo Lincoyán Cavieres Figueroa (16 August 1945 − 12 December 2021) was a Chilean historian and academic who won the Chilean National History Award in 2008.
His greatest contributions were in the field of Social and Economic history of Ch ...
,
became the second best-selling book at the 2016 Lima International Book Fair. His second historical novel, ''Balmaceda'', appeared in 2016. The same year he released the novel ''Crónicas secretas de la economía chilena'' (''Secret chronicle of the Chilean economy''), which analyzes the privatization of state companies from 1974 to 1994, as well as the origin of
Sebastián Piñera's fortune.
His success as a fiction writer was consolidated in 2017 with his third historical novel, ''Santa María de
Iquique'', about the massacre at the school of the same name of entire families —Bolivian, Chilean and Peruvian—, murdered by soldiers of the
Chilean Army in December 1907. The work has been on the list of best sellers and was selected as one of the best books of the year by a group of ten critics and cultural journalists. The same year, he also published ''La Señora de Dolor'', a remake of ''Karma'', which, in Tromben's words, 'is not a 2.0 version of that book, but another novel', because 'they are the same characters, but located in a parallel universe, similar, but not identical'.
Works
Fiction
* ''Poderes fácticos'', policial novel, Mercurio Aguilar, 2003
* ''Prácticas rituales'', policial novel,
Alfaguara
Alfaguara is a Spanish-language publishing house that serves markets in Latin America, Spain and the United States. It was founded by the Spanish writer and Nobel prize winner Camilo José Cela.
History and profile
Alfaguara was established in ...
, 2005
* ''Karma'', novel,
Seix Barral
Planeta Corporación, S.R.L., doing business as Grupo Planeta (), is a Spanish mass media conglomerate operating in Spain, Portugal, France and Latin America. It is the world's leading Spanish-language book publisher.
Editorial Planeta, founded in ...
, 2006
* ''Perdidos en el espacio I'', stories, Calabaza del Diablo, 2008
* ''La Casa de Electra'', thriller, Alfaguara, 2010
* ''Perdidos en el espacio II'', stories, Calabaza del Diablo, 2011
* ''Huáscar'', Historical novel,
Ediciones B, 2015 (Estruendomudo, Lima, 2016)
* ''Balmaceda'', Historical novel, Ediciones B, 2016
* ''La señora de dolor''; Ediciones B, 2017
* ''Santa María de Iquique, la muerte de la República'', Historical novel, Ediciones B, 2017
* ''El vino de Dios'', Thriller, Ediciones B, 2019
No-fiction
* ''Crónica secreta de la economía chilena'', Essay, Ediciones B, 2016
* ''Pescado Rabioso'', Essay, Ediciones B, 2018
* ''Brevario del Neoliberalismo'', Essay, Mandrágora, 2019
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tromben, Carlos
1966 births
Living people
21st-century Chilean male writers
21st-century Chilean novelists
Chilean journalists
Chilean male novelists
Chilean people of German descent
Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso alumni
Writers from Valparaíso