“VENERDÌ RE-VERSO” “[…] the infinite depth of the dream behind the stars.” Without getting too esoteric, it must be said that sometimes the coincidences that connect us to books have a certain oracular quality, like when the random player plays the exact song you were thinking about. And we’ve been thinking a lot about dreams lately. Will we classify it as suggestion, or will we choose to believe in that bit of magic that...
Halfway between a sweet classic tale of The Little Match Girl and a heartbreaking glimpse into contemporary life, Stargate is a book capable of striking all the right chords. How to describe it? How to talk about the power of Christmas magic? How to recount the delicate relationship between sisters? How to explain what it means to be forced to care for someone? How to talk about a burden so heavy that it weighs down...
“In the evening he read stories aloud to me […] and during the day he taught me how to do a handstand, because he absolutely wanted to make me see the world upside down.” Just a tip: open the book to the first page and read it aloud, steadily. We’re faced with a precise frame, like in a movie, and the camera frames, piece by piece, individual parts of a scene that we miraculously manage...
Valley of Flowers by Niviaq Korneliussen is undoubtedly the novel I loved the most last year, a book capable of getting under your skin, uncomfortable and powerful just like its author. A writer who had already established herself in Greenland in 2014, when with her debut she had spoken, for the first time in her country, of queer issues. Issues so current that they return in this novel too. The story is that of an...
“The commuter’s journey, well, it’s not a journey. It’s three dots in brackets.” We won’t beat around the bush in this review: if you’re here, it’s because you’re looking for a good book, one that can not only keep you company, but that can also really give you something more. We’re talking about Björn Larsson’s Philosophy of the Commuter, which at first glance is aimed only at a certain type of reader: a commuter who...
“FRIDAY RE-VERSO” “The footprint of a life is everywhere.” A Malaysian anthropologist, transplanted to Norway, manages to overcome her husband’s sudden bereavement thanks to an unexpected encounter with the world of mushrooms. It seems that the community of readers really liked this book: it praises its delicacy and the unusual but refined way in which two apparently very distant themes, mourning and mycology, were brought together. We’re a bit perplexed. The book flows, as they...
The books chosen by Andrea Salonia This review is available only in the original language _________________________________________________________________________ Credo che un libro così dovremmo leggerlo un poco tutti. O meglio: tutti attraversiamo almeno un momento tanto particolare nel corso delle nostre esistenze da rendere utile, fin necessaria, la lettura di un romanzo come Naif.Super. Naif.Super esce per la penna di Erlend Loe, scrittore norvegese classe 1969, nel 1996; io l’ho lasciato sullo scaffale delle librerie più volte, non avendone...
The books chosen by Andrea Salonia This review is available only in the original language _________________________________________________________________________ “La mia vita non è qualcosa che si debba misurare”. Difficilmente avrei potuto trovare incipit più concreto e dicotomico per la Pillola del DOC di oggi. È lì, nelle poche densissime pagine de Il nostro bisogno di consolazione, apparso nel 1952 grazie alla penna anarcoide e disperata di Stig Dagerman, pubblicato da Iperborea con la traduzione di Fulvio Ferrari....
“FRIDAY RE-VERSO” “Time treats us strangely – most often unexpected”. Have you ever read a book that is a blizzard? Let’s try talk about this blizzard done of pages and ink. “Story of a family”, the subtitle. And as the wise man said, every happy family and so on. This family has its roots in the water, if the fish have no legs it is because the immensity of the sea does not allow for the surface,...
The books chosen by Andrea Salonia This review is available only in the original language _________________________________________________________________________ Scompartimento N. 6 è capace di evocare molte suggestioni, e molto diverse tra loro. Rosa Liksom, acclamata autrice finlandese, ha scritto ormai alcuni anni addietro questo romanzo denso che pare melassa, ma al tempo di una leggerezza disarmante, violento e tenerissimo insieme, un romanzo degli opposti stati d’animo, che mi ha incuriosito già per la deliziosa prima di copertina,...
