Julian Zabalbeascoa, Author — University of Massachusetts Lowell Creator’s Fund Recipient
ABOUT THIS PROJECT
Julian Zabalbeascoa — Associate Director of Honors Experiential Learning at the University of Massachusetts Lowell and author of the novel What We Tried to Bury Grows Here — is at work on his second novel, currently untitled. Set in Gernika and Donostia in December 1999, days after ETA walked away from their ceasefire, the book follows three primary characters: the granddaughter of Isidro (a central figure in Zabalbeascoa’s debut), a young Kale Barroka member seeking entry into ETA, and a counterterrorist police officer whose personal life has unraveled. The novel is at once a love letter to the Basque Country of the late 1990s and a searching examination of those groups — ETA, Kale Barroka, branches of the Spanish police, and elements of the Spanish government — whose choices made lasting peace unreachable.
Zabalbeascoa describes the novel as an attempt to thread a needle: to allow readers to genuinely understand each character’s reality, however uncomfortable, without sacrificing factual accuracy. The Creator’s Fund award supported the extensive historical research required to do that story justice. The manuscript is in progress, with the first third shared with the BEO Grants Committee in April 2026. A final title is forthcoming.
WHY IT MATTERS
December 1999 is one of the most consequential and least understood moments in modern Basque history. ETA’s decision to walk away from the ceasefire didn’t just end a peace process — it foreclosed possibilities that still haven’t fully been reckoned with. Zabalbeascoa isn’t writing a polemic about it. He’s writing a novel, which means he has to make you understand people whose choices you might find indefensible. That’s harder than taking sides, and it’s more useful. The Basque Country has largely moved on from that era, but moving on isn’t the same as understanding. This book is an attempt at the latter.om the beginning.