Leonardo Padura

Leonardo Padura Fuentes
Leonardo Padura Fuentes
Born	1955 (age 61–62) Cuba, Havana
Occupation	Novelist, journalist
Language	Spanish
Nationality	Cuban, Spanish
Genre	Crime fiction, journalism
Notable works	Fiebre de caballos, Adiós, Hemingway, El hombre que amaba a los perros

Leonardo de la Caridad Padura Fuentes (born 1955) is a Cuban novelist and journalist. As of 2007^[update], he is one of Cuba's best known writers internationally. In his native Spanish, as well as in English and some other languages, he is often referred to by the shorter form of his name, Leonardo Padura. He has written screenplays, two books of short stories and a series of detective novels translated into 10 languages. In 2012, Padura was awarded the National Prize for Literature, Cuba's national literary award and the most important award of its kind. In 2015, was awarded with Premio Principe de Asturias de las Letras of Spain, the most important prize in Iberoamerica and usually called as the Iberoamerican Nobel Prize.

Padura, who was born in Havana, took a degree in Latin American literature at the University of Havana. In 1980 he first came to prominence as an investigative journalist in a literary magazine called Caimán Barbudo, a well-established publication that is still in print today. He subsequently became known as an essayist and a writer of screenplays and in particular, detective novels.

He wrote his first short novel between 1983 and 1984. Titled Fiebre de caballos (Horse Fever), it was basically a love story. He then spent the next six years continuing to work as a journalist, reporting on a wide range of cultural and historical topics. However around this time he began to write his first novel featuring police officer Mario Conde, and while he was writing it, Padura realised how fundamental his years as a journalist were to his development as a writer. Firstly it gave him a whole new experience of the country, and secondly, it consequently changed his style with respect to his first book.

In 2013, France named him a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

Padura is best known in the English-speaking world for his quartet of detective novels featuring lieutenant Mario Conde. Collectively titled Las cuatro estaciones (The four seasons), sometimes called The Havana Quartet in their English translations. Conde is a cop who would rather be a writer, and admits to feelings of "solidarity with writers, crazy people, and drunkards". The novels are: