Nerea Pérez de las Heras, a journalist and communicator from Madrid born in 1982, suffered a boat accident in July 2023 during a vacation in the Balearic Islands that caused the amputation of her right leg due to a propeller strike. This event radically transformed her life, forcing her to learn new ways of walking, feeling pain, and relating to her own body.
In her book "Fantasma," published by Alfaguara, Pérez de las Heras addresses her own story with a clarity that critics describe as superb and full of nuances. The work does not seek to indoctrinate or give lessons, but rather aims to illuminate what happens when a body changes and aspects such as dependency, money, public healthcare, and care are exposed.
The author had spent years working as a journalist, analyzing topics such as machismo, politics, power, and precarity, with a style characterized by making the complex comprehensible without diminishing it. According to the article, she possesses the rare gift of delving into matters, peeling back the layers of reality until she finds hidden truths.
Pérez de las Heras acknowledges that feminism has helped her accept herself and get along with her transformed body. The book explores not only the physical experience of amputation but also the social and personal implications that arise when the body ceases to function as before.
