“Perfect: an insult from an ignorant person is always flattering.” We picked this book up at random in a bookstore, drawn by the cover. We didn’t know the author and felt guilty, but then we discovered it was a debut novel, and so we felt justified. So, first of all, let’s start by complimenting the publisher for a spot-on graphic design. The story is about Isa M., a young student from Turin who organizes a...
“FRIDAY RE-VERSO” “And when the driver, suspicious of that silence, turned around […] he saw them so alone in the world and recognized them in the caprice of God and in the irremediable violence of nature.” “Old village” is one of those books that when you recommend them together you say “lucky you, you’re reading it for the first time”. Because we would like to reread it right away but we are stuck in a...
“FRIDAY RE-VERSO” “For an hour he remained contemplating the great pearly clouds perpetually suspended above the horizon, and from their beauty he drew a sense of resignation that did not allow his reason to examine.” We wander through the shelves full of new products on which out of intellectual humility (or decency) we do not judge but which clearly have little to tell us. Unexpected, there, in a little corner, mild and modest, a small blue...
“No one – it has been written – is ever all in a gesture he makes, whether good or bad.” The text recounts and reports twenty-six years of letters exchanged between the judge, author of the book, and Salvatore, a man on whose head a heavy sentence is placed: sentence never ends. A concept on which we too have hardly ever dwelt, but which deserves further study. This narration has the quality of making us...
“FRIDAY RE-VERSO” “There was nothing I could say about that world except that I had known it, that it had been mine, that it still was.” Cosidering that there is a lot to talk about, here is a brief summary of the plot: forced by her father to separate from his beloved Jade, David Axelrod sets the family home on fire, with nebulous and somewhat delusional purposes. Here it begins: for four years, two of...
The books chosen by Federica Dagonese This review is available only in the original language _________________________________________________________________________ Mi accorgo di aver letto un buon libro quando le provo tutte, ma proprio tutte – come i capricci dei bambini – per poterne ritardare fino all’inverosimile la fine. Non l’ho letto tutto d’un fiato: ne inizio la lettura quando con stupore mi accorgo di averne divorato metà, mi fermo, metto il segnalibro e penso che sia una trappola seducente! Passo a...
The books chosen by Federica Dagonese This review is available only in the original language _________________________________________________________________________ Tre sono stati i motivi che mi hanno spinto ad acquistare questo libro. Il primo è che non si tratta di un Sellerio dalla classica copertina blu, ma vi è un quadro dalle tonalità tenui (che poi sarebbe il secondo motivo, appunto) e non ho saputo resistere alla bellezza- insomma mi ha colpito questa serie di edizioni diversa; infine...
The books chosen by Andrea Salonia This review is available only in the original language _________________________________________________________________________ Mia madre dice spesso che essere genitore è complesso, e che fare il genitore è il mestiere più difficile che ci sia. Per me, che genitore non sono e che vorrei e avrei fortissimamente voluto essere padre, amando profondamente un essere venuto al mondo, cercando di dar spazio e fine a tutto quell’amore che c’è dentro, soffocandolo quasi di...
“FRIDAY DI-VERSO” “…surprised about how long I’d lived, still unsure how it was going to end.” Perhaps a review would be needed for each chapter. Or those scholastic questions of understanding the text, for once without the obscene hassle of a “right” or “wrong”. Because this, gentlemen, is a book that poses many questions. Starting from the choice of a population of the undergrowth as the protagonist: is it a (black) fairy tale? a satire? an...
Written by Donatella Lanza This review is available only in the original language. _______________________________________________________ Si può parteggiare per il protagonista di un romanzo quando è un convinto membro dell’esercito nazista? Siamo a Cracovia nell’ottobre del 1939, Martin Bora è un capitano della Wehrmacht di stanza nella città polacca appena invasa dai nazisti. E’ iniziata la Seconda Guerra Mondiale. In un contesto completamente in subbuglio, dove gli ultimi ribelli tentano di resistere e gli ebrei...
