I met her through a beautiful book, designed as she wanted, for children; just a year and two months ago. I think she did it with special intention for her Manatí children. I won't be able to know. Sadly, and in its brutal way, the COVID-19 snatched the writer Irma Rosa Govín from us.

Las Tunas, Cuba.- Manatí is in mourning. Literature in Las Tunas loses a creator who knew how to illuminate with her letters the paths of the Sanlope publishing house, in charge of publishing Cuentos de Piedra Chica (Stories from Piedra Chica), a book that was part of the Las Tunas stand at the 2020 Havana International Book Fair and that, beyond success, gave us that deep sensitivity that marked her talent.

The animal-loving poet, admired friend, passionate creator dedicated to storytelling, dramaturgy, and cultural promotion - with responsibility and love - is gone. The virus attacked her soul of light; it killed her body, but will not take her legacy. Irma Rosa's life will always be on the pages of her books, in the children's smile, in the history of local and national culture, in the multiple awards she received.

I leaf through Cuentos de Piedra Chica and I feel her throbbing in each letter. She is also that fantasy that makes the protagonists of this entertaining and well-edited book “rational and human”. It will be, eternally, an enjoyable and instructive read.

Irma Rosa Govín is magical, like the friends in the 12 stories of “Piedra Chica.” She is the star that lights up her dear Manatí. She is the hope that shakes us after the tidal wave of sadness. Because this damn pandemic, luckily for us, does not bring oblivion in any of its deadly spikes. It has already been proven that good people do not die.