Joaquim Amat-Piniella (November 22, 1913 in Manresa – August 3, 1974 in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat) was a Catalan writer. He is best known for his semi-autobiographic novel K.L. Reich, based on his experience as a prisoner in the Mauthausen concentration camp during the Second World War. Biography Manresa Amat-Piniella was born in Manresa in 1913. His father, Joaquim Amat i Palà, was a confectioner and his mother, Concepció Piniella i Blanqué, was a teacher of music and a painter. He was educated at home by his parents before attending secondary school in Manresa and then beginning a law degree. Amat-Piniella began writing articles and essays at a young age and at the age of twenty he published his first novel. With the advent of the Spanish Second Republic, he threw himself into the political and cultural life of his home town. He became a member of Republican Left of Catalonia (Catalan: Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya) and in December 1932 he was appointed secretary to the mayor of Manresa. Following the Events of the 6 October (Catalan: Els fets del 6 d’Octubre) he, along with the mayor and councillors, was imprisoned in the Model Prison in Barcelona (Catalan: Presó Model de Barcelona). In February 1936, he was able to return to his post at the Town Hall, following the victory of the left-wing Frente Popular (Popular Front) coalition (in Catalonia and Valencia: Front d'Esquerres) in the Spanish general elections. The Spanish Civil War Following the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he gave up his law degree and volunteered to join the Republican army. He studied at the Artillery School in Barcelona and graduated after two months as a lieutenant. He saw action in Aragon, Andalusia and the province of Valencia. It was here that he found himself at the end of the Civil War. Unlike many of his fellow Republican soldiers, he was fortunate to possess civilian clothes and was able to return incognito to Catalonia. It was here that he married Maria Llaveries I Viladomiu, a teacher. However, aware of the danger he faced as a member of Esquerra Republicana and ex-Republican soldier, soon after their marriage he crossed the border into France, where he was interned by the French authorities in the Barcarès, Argelers and Sant Cebrià camps, along with tens of thousands of other Spanish Republican refugees. As a result of the extremely poor conditions in the