This book published in 1970 after fifteen years of the interview he gave to derail the Colombian newspaper El Espectador (closed by the regime then in force) is a recognition of the value of the sailor Luis Alejandro Velasco "naufrago", whom the writer acknowledges the copyright because in his opinion "There are books that are not who writes but who suffers" (Pág.12), but also marks the beginning of our exile of Nobel Prize in Europe. The story, based on facts from real life, narrated in the first person (narrator protagonist) events before, during and after the crash of Caldas destroyer, the Navy of Colombia; occurred in the waters of the Caribbean Sea; the cause: The existence of evil merchandise stowed on the ship, which when released, shaken by the strong winds of the high seas, dragged the eight sailors, dying seven of them and leaving one to drift for ten days, the sailor Alejandro Velasco , who suffer the most harrowing experience on the high seas, finally-after being considered a hero-expusado the marina and destitute. History shows us: FIRST as willpower and the instinct for survival of a human being desperate, you can do survive hard evidence, without the baggage that steely determination to continue with life in a hostile arena. Even when the most dramatic moments are violating their will and want to die, provided for some reason or divine magic something that happens again esperanzar.
Finally, the tenth day adrift, without forces, hungry, thirsty and in deplorable physical condition, reaches discover the coast of Colombia, reached desperate rowing, swimming, crawling moribund. Secondly, space and time are conjugated in the works reflect the realities of a time and a country in two stages and through two characters, a hero who returns to be another. Luis Alejandro Velasco and its real history and following racks, not part of the story and yet another in a kind of "fiction reader" is the other story that touches us imagine, the author Gabriel Garcia Marquez, which stems from THE HISTORY OF THIS STORY (p. 9-12). The writer experienced at first hand the abuses of the regime shift (Gral., Gustavo Rojas Pinilla), which tried to prevent history left in the light… was to reveal the truth about the crash of the destroyer Caldas, which played a height of the prevailing system. This short and simple book (102 pp.) Keeps us alert from start to finish, is a work to read it nonstop.