I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness is a haunting and vibrant novel set in a Catalonian farmhouse where the line between life and death blurs. As an impossibly old woman lies dying, the spirits of all the women who have lived in the house prepare for her arrival, unraveling centuries of stories filled with dark deals, laughter, and loss. Irene Solà crafts a mesmerizing tale that weaves together folklore, history, and the supernatural.

What a strange little book! The writing style is very distinct and I really enjoy it but I think both the content and the repetition of various descriptive words will not be for all readers. At various points this felt a bit like a fever dream and I felt myself trying to place where we were in the story and how to process all of the information about the family. I really enjoyed the way the book was split into sections by time of day. Overall a really enjoyable read and I think it’s something I’m going to have to pick up again soon! It wasn’t a long book but it was definitely immersive! This reminded me of how I felt when I first read One Hundred Years of Solitude!

Reading I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness was like being pulled into a dream you’re not sure you want to wake up from—equal parts haunting, poetic, and piercingly alive. Irene Solà doesn’t just tell a story; she evokes a world that feels mythic and immediate, rooted in land, memory, and the unspoken things passed down through generations.

The structure itself is fluid, more like a tapestry than a straight line. Voices shift, time bends, and you start to realize that this book isn’t meant to be consumed passively—it asks you to listen, to feel, and sometimes, to sit with not fully understanding. But that ambiguity never feels like a trick. It feels earned. Organic. Beautiful, even in its darkness.

The characters—human and otherwise—don’t just inhabit the story; they become it. There’s a deep sense of connection between people and place, grief and joy, the visible and invisible. It’s as much about presence as it is about absence—what lingers after someone is gone, what the earth remembers when we forget.

I found myself rereading certain passages just to sit with the language. It’s lyrical without being precious, emotionally raw without ever tipping into melodrama. There’s a quiet power in how Solà writes—something that gets under your skin and stays there.

This isn’t a book that rushes to explain itself. It unfolds on its own terms, and you either go with it or you don’t. I did—and I came out the other side feeling moved, disoriented, and strangely comforted.

If you’re drawn to stories that blur the line between the real and the surreal, that center landscape and language as much as plot, this one is a gift. It’s not an easy read, but it’s a deeply rewarding one.

Irene Solà is one of those writers whose style you recognise from the first page.

Her stories are steeped in Catalan folklore, deep in the forest, existing outside of time. The characters are portrayed as ugly animals, they fart, shit, smell bad and have sex - if there is the opportunity for a disgusting sentence Solà will write it.

'I Gave You Eyes...' is set during one day, from dawn to nightfall, as women gather in a large countryhouse in the expectation of the imminent death of their family member Bernadeta. It took me a while to realise what was going in, but during the day we travel through centuries of family history, all the way from the matriarch to the dying Bernadeta and her daughter and granddaughter. It reminded me of One Hundred Years of Solitude more than once, but completely different at the same time.

Some may find the stories off-putting and I liked it less than its predecessor 'When I Sing...' but it's hard to deny the quality of the writing.