Until I saw this photo, I’d never seen a pirated edition of my first book of stories, War by Candlelight – which was always something of a disappointment to me. Most Peruvian writers have a complicated relationship to the concept of piracy – it is, in some ways, the equivalent of reaching the bestseller lists. You both hope for and dread being pirated. It’s certainly flattering to see one’s work in such good company, flanked by Mario Vargas Llosa, Juan José Millás, Gabriel García Márquez, Truman Capote, and José Saramago – along with the obligatory volumes of Sudoko and self-help, naturally. An early morning raid of this gallery in June of last year yielded 90,000 unauthorised books. The vendors were restocked within a dayPhotograph: Claudia Alva