Books & Reviews Archive

The book is an investigative narrative, presented through a series of interviews with immigrants. It spans from the Eastern European prostitute to individuals who have achieved success in the economic, social, and political spheres. What emerges is a highly variegated picture, revealing that, paradoxically, integrating and climbing the social ladder was easier for immigrants who arrived in 1970s

Issa is actually an Italian young man named Christian. He has a perfect command of Arabic. Consequently, the secret services decide to recruit him and dispatch him to Viale Marconi in Rome under the guise of a Tunisian immigrant. His mission is to gather intelligence on a suspected terrorist cell, allegedly operating out of a call center. Sofia—or rather Safia—is an Egyptian woman who married

The novel recounts the peculiar story of Victor, a ghostwriter who is invited over one evening by a married woman, Marta; however, on the verge of making love, Marta dies, and Victor, frightened and uncertain, leaves the house without alerting anyone. Seized by remorse and curiosity, he manages to make contact with Marta’s family: her father, a Madrilenian gentleman; her sister, with whom he hope

The novel is set in the early seventeenth century and narrates the exploits of a country gentleman who, inflamed by chivalric tales, imagines himself to be a knight-errant. He thus embarks on a journey through La Mancha with his squire, Sancho Panza, and two faithful beasts: the horse Rocinante and the donkey. The novel is structured in two parts. In the first part, the most incredible episodes

The delicate elegance of the writing welcomes the reader from the novel’s very first pages: the prosaic, tranquil life of a provincial town, daily routines, rigid social roles, thwarted romances, predictable and mundane existence are described with such affectionate and ironic detail that one wishes the story would continue along this path, as if it were a modern, condensed edition of Marcel Prous

The book is autobiographical in nature and historically set in the early twentieth century. The protagonist, still a girl, is raped by a young man whom she later marries and with whom she has a child. She lives with her husband in a small provincial town, where she strives to abide by social conventions that dictate a woman be confined to the home, in total dependence on man. When her husband l

In upper-bourgeois Turin, a crime is committed: a former Romanian prostitute, married to a wealthy banker, is found strangled. It is later revealed that she was killed by two thugs, hired by the banker's "dear" friend, jealous and bent on revenge after being rejected. The narrative unfolds through the accounts of women involved in one way or another in the crime: the caretaker who discovered the

Fridolin and Albertine are a couple belonging to the solid, respectable bourgeoisie. Their union is founded on "a perfect interpenetration of feelings and ideas." Yet, a masked ball is all it takes—where both had been courted, he "with insinuating kindness," she > at first fascinated and then suddenly offended... with an insolent swearword , for them to be brushed by, > and not for the fir

> He wears old boots, one gaping open at the toe, like a toothless grin. (...) But ultimately nobody sees him, because in Milan, even with the Universal Exposition and its status as the center of the world, a homeless man pushing a cart filled with his life is merely part of the landscape, and thus invisible . With this image of commonplace social indifference, the novel held out the promise of a

The figure of Dracula has spawned a literary and cinematographic output that has exalted its horrific aspects, thereby distorting the complexity of Stoker's novel. The opening of the narrative reflects the preconceived notion we have of Dracula’s story. Jonathan Harker, a young real estate solicitor, travels to the Carpathians to conclude the sale of a property to Count Dracula, who intends to mov

Thiongʼo is a Kenyan writer, and in this book he recounts his youth in 1950s Kenya, torn apart by ruthless British repression. It is not a political or historical text, although references to figures and events in the history of the African nation are numerous. > Despite my dashed hopes, the events, even the arrival of British battalions, were largely abstract, happening in a misty land as far

> For ten years now I had been living up here in Vallorgàna alone, in the villa of my ancestors. (...) I was certain that I found myself in the best fortune I could desire. Nothing of importance occurred in my days. Nothing complex entangled my gaze. No disruption in daily life. No decision to hinder my stride . Such is the opening of the tale of the man we will come to know only as the Duke. Hei

The setting is India and the cruel Thugs, who have abducted Tremal-Naik’s daughter to make her the “virgin of the pagoda” in service to the ruthless deity, Kali. Sandokan and Yanez set out to rescue the young girl, embarking on an expedition that leads them into the Ganges Delta—a swampy expanse infested with ferocious beasts and plagued by cholera—down into the subterranean lairs inhabited by th

We find ourselves in Germany in the years immediately following the Second World War. The wounds of war are still palpable, physical and psychological: destruction, destitution, memories of the conflict’s horrors, and no hope for the future. Fred, a telephone operator at the city’s archbishopric, has abandoned the family home where his wife, Kate, and their children live, after catching himself

*The Shadow of the Sun* is a collection of notes from journeys across Africa spanning thirty years: from the independence of the continent to its more recent upheavals, such as the Rwandan genocide. The book encompasses both the nature of an essay and that of a memoir of lived experience, profoundly engaging for the author. A penniless reporter for an equally cash-strapped Warsaw daily, Kapuścińsk

We are in Maine in 1934: in the wake of the Great Depression, a family has had to leave the city and relocate to the foot of a mountain, on the edge of the forest, adapting to life in an environment entirely foreign to their urban past. The mother confesses to her daughter Ellie, still an adolescent: > she looked at her ruined hands. I feel like a stranger in this new skin. I left behind too muc

Nicolai Lilin comes from Transnistria (a no man’s land between Moldova and Ukraine) and writes in Italian. He belongs to that cohort of immigrant authors who are making a significant contribution to the renewal of our literature, so often bloodless. And indeed, the novel overflows with energy, with a vitality and brutality barely kept in check by the canons and formative paths generated within t

Eugenio is a well-known Italian set and costume designer living in Los Angeles. A phone call from Italy takes him back to the origins of his career and to the figure of Olga. Many years earlier, when he was still in Italy, Eugenio had had an affair with a friend of his wife, namely Olga: > petite, pretty, dark-haired, with fringe and kiss curls à la Louise Brooks (...) she had an elusive, ambi

Renée is the concierge of an elegant Parisian apartment building, inhabited by well-to-do bourgeois families. Outwardly, she behaves like a typical concierge: obliging, reserved, and humble. In reality, Renée is a woman of vast culture and refined intellect: she reads high literature, takes an interest in philosophy, listens to fine music, and appreciates quality cinema. She never reveals these

Upon picking up this novel by Grazia Deledda, one's mind immediately turns to *Canne al Vento* (see the review on this site), hoping to rediscover the same magical atmosphere of the Sardinian author’s masterpiece. The environmental and social context is the same; here too, pain is treated as destiny, life as a journey toward death, yet that living, magical, and indecipherable nature—the hallmark o

Emma is a young woman, determined, independent, but inclined “to think a little too well of herself.” She lives in a small English country town with her father: a frail widower, fearful of novelties and above all of being abandoned by his adored daughter. Then again, why marry? > If I were to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing! But I have never been in love; it is not in my wa

We are in the East, in the magical empire of Akbar the Great. > If the war-torn world was a hard truth, then Sikri (the capital of the empire) was a splendid lie . It is a magical world where the mystery of the great sovereign "enchants all the earth, and the future, and all of eternity." Into this wondrous land arrives a traveler hailing from the West, who calls himself Mogor dellʼAmore. He

Like much of McEwan’s fiction, we are confronted at the outset with an extraordinary event (in this case, the death of a person falling from a hot-air balloon) that brings profound upheaval to a life that seemed quiet and settled: the couple’s relationship enters a crisis, an undercurrent of paranoia and instability emerges within the protagonist, and his professional choices are called into quest

The poem recounts the journey of Aeneas toward Italy and the war he was forced to wage > so that he might found his city and bring the Penates into Latium, giving rise to the Latin race, the Alban fathers, and the lofty walls of Rome (Book One). The poem is divided into two parts. The first, which chronicles his wanderings until his arrival on the shores of Latium, adopts the structure of th