Il Mantello di Rut by Paolo Rodari

 

I´ve continued my Italian reading adventure with a very profound book about freedom and belief during terrible times. 

Il mantello di Rut (Ruth´s Cloak, which is the biblical Ruth who willingly followed her mother in law Naomi in her belief, for Jews a symbol of dedication on behalf of the converts, although the Christian interpretation escapes me right now) by journalist and teologically trained Paolo Rodari is set during the end of WWII in Nazi-occupied Italy. The main date that put into motion the tragic chain of events is the 16th of October 1943, a Saturday, the day of the Holy Shabbat, when the German forces raided the Jewish ghetto of Roome, arresting 1,259 persons. Out of 1,023 sent to Auschwitz, only 16 survived.  

Remo, the Catholic monk storyteller, is writing to Aida, a little Jewish girl who saved during the German occupation, with whose mother he fell in love. Inspired by his own tortured relationship with his emotionally numb mother, who sent him to the seminary due to lack of financial resources after the death of his father, he is sharing his story to the little girl, who stayed hidden without being forced to be baptized as often happened with other Jewish children ´rescued´ by the Church - until her uncle found her and picked her up in her new life. 

He writes to keep Rachel´s memory alive, who most probably was killed by the Germans, but also to explain his own choices, his difference compared to other people of faith. Remo is talking a lot about the freedom to decide: to stay or to go, to help or stay indifferent, to fall in love or follow the faith. The approaches are nuanced and very direct, echoing the thoughts someone may have about life, humanity and religion during terrible times.

Il mantello di Rut is a condensed yet very thoughtful read which is trying to counter the documented cases when the Catholic Church and its representatives were complacent with the Germans and manifested antisemitic attitudes. 

Inspired by the topic, I may continue some individual researches about this topic soon. 

The Italian is level B2 mostly, easy to understand without using a dictionary more than 25% of the reading.

Rating: 4 stars

Rachel´s Random Resources: Postcards from Sicily by Nancy Barone

Estranged by her mother who left her and her father 20 years ago, running with a younger Italian of noble origins, Olivia/Livvie has her own struggles: a love-less marriage, a rebelious teenage daughter, the secret feelings for her business partner Markus. But it seems that most of her life decisions are following her desperate need of being different than Susan, her mother, not abandoning and disappointing her family.

Despite her refusal to be in touch with Susan, her father kept talking with his ex-wife once the week and he tried - and suceed - to convince her accept two months of fully paid spa stay. Will this stay heal the old wounds and will bring answers to Livvie´s tormenting questions about her mother´s sudden disappearance? Would she reconsider her personal options after all?

Postcards from Sicily by Nancy Barone is a humorous and delicious rom-com that delicately deals with trauma´s impact on our lives. Livvie was deeply hurt and for at least 20 years she carried the weight of those events. ´An introvert at heart´ as she describes herself, she internalized the deep sadness her mother tried to escape. She is not depressed though, just over-reacting and nervous. As she is taking this 2-month break, the time is perfect for a change.

This is a romcom about second chances and the power to forgive, with a dash of hope happening in the breathtaking landscape of lake Maggiore in Italy. 

I´ve read this book this weekend during my summer extended holidays and made me think a lot about the many delicate ways in which a mother-daughter relationship can consume itself, but also heal.

Rating: 3.5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered as part of the book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own

The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont

Abandoned by her husband Archibald, who left her for a secretary, shortly after the death of her mother, Agatha Christie disappeared for around 11 days in December 1926. Police, mediums, the famous Arthur Conan Doyle, everyone was looking for her all over England. After she was found, she confessed of being unaware where she was, a psychological effect of double trauma and sudden shock. 

In the vein of a late trend in historical fiction, Nina de Gramont built a story that focuses on the lover, a peripheral figure that received a voice of her own. The Christie Affair may only talk about Agatha, the famous and beloved one, and this only from the voice of Nan, the forgotten one, revealing a different story, with a motivation - no matter how wrong - and an equally important traumatic episode of the children stolen by the Irish Catholic Church from unmarried mothers. This sitution touched between 60,000 and 80,000 and lasted until late 1990s.

In between the back and forth from Nan´s story and Agatha´s wheareabouts after her disappearance, there is also a sweet crime twists that almost woke me up when the pace was too slow and not sure where it was leading to. 

The writing is very engaging, focused on ambiance and psyhological details and a rich historical background, covering the Irish episode, but also the trauma of the post War I soldiers. The characters are talking to the reader with an authentic refined voice.

I was interested in the book as was looking for some new authors and topics outside my immediate area of interest, but the reading dragged for a week, with an interest that varied from low to adverse - as I took the Nan characters too personally. As my next reads are historical fiction, this book just opened my voracious reading appetite for more nuances and fictional perspectives.

Rating: 3 stars

Random Things Tours: Faculty of Liars by R.L.Heber

Elizabeth Harker may be the wife of America´s most powerful university president, but she has a dark secret to hide. As her lover is killed the day she is expected to deliver a worldwide important speech, her involvement in solving the case may be limited due to their secret affair. More questions and doubts arise, the wider the web of lies that seems to cover the glamour she and her fellow academics falsely surrounded themselves.

Faculty of Liars by R.L.Heber - who also writes as journalist and novelist Rebecca Thornton - is a dark academic thriller happening in one of the most unexpected location to place a thriller. This was what actually attracted me to the book in the first place, but I definitely stayed for the smart plot and the surprising connections between characters. 

In the end, it delivered more than I ever expected. I loved the dribbling wih the secret Elizabeth was forced to play, and although not surprised, experienced directly the gradual disenchantment with the academic world. I am relatively familiar with it too, although murder is a bit beyond my expectations as well.

I was enchanted by the precise writing and the smart planning of the plot, and felt relatively satisfied with the ending. It was a tense and twists-rich read that was definitely worth my time and involvement.

Rating: 5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered as part of the book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own

Camping by Lavinia Braniște

Sofia, a Romanian who left in Spain for 20 years, is approaching her retirement. Living in the camping where she took care of the reception and basic maintenance, she is getting ready to return to her small town in the Eastern part of the country, where her 90-year old father and son are waiting for her. But would she find her place there? Are they actually waiting for her, or for her help? She has no strong friendships left in any of the countries, she spent most of her life working, saving money for purchasing an apartment for her son. 

Camping by Lavinia Braniște is my second book by this Romanian author and my first book in Romanian this year. I may confess that I´ve found the wording a bit awkward, and clumsy, with words that I had to think twice before figuring out what they mean. It may be that my Romanian is sometimes rusty and I seldom read literature, but this is part of my personal linguistic investigation. Also, who may call her son, in the second decade of 2000s, in a moment of anger ´You, communist!´?

As many people having left their home lands and with them, their mother tongue, while not fully acquiding the language of their new country, Sofia is caught in between worlds that none may look closer. Her speaking is mixing Spanish words used for everyday use. My observation as a translator from and into few languages is that there are usually the words relevant for work or bureaucratic conformity retained in the local language and the more you use the less relevant the translation.

Her son, Robert, whom she left with her father when he was four, took him to Spain for a short amount of time before he requested to return, has a different take on life, although with the same result. He is living the moment, trying to work less and earn more, selling the apartment his mother bought to invest in crypto and lose. Sofia, on her side, is actively observing, but is not consumed by the hunger of living more, of challenging her current situation.

The objects Sofia collected, as milestones for her human interactions and her 20 years in Spain, are shipped back home. It is a reminder for the time spent here, they are small memories in her life. Each insignificant souvenir tells a story of an encounter. 

Personally, I was hoping/wishing that Sofia is staying. That in a turn of destiny something happens and she take control of her life and is not coming back. 

Her story is an iteration of many other lifes of individuals, Romanians for instance, who left their countries because of social, economic and politic circumstances. The fragments from Facebook groups of ´Romanians in Spain´ are outlining the interactions in the new country. (Once I´ve watched some posts by ´Romanians in Germany´ and the interactions sounded so similar, almost copied/pasted). They are not heroes, but driven by survival and a normal life refused by their home countries. Some may stay, some cannot wait to return.

Camping was a deeply sad book it will stay with me longer. I hope to read other books in Romanian this year, but need to do a bit of extra research first for finding relevant topics for my daily interests.

Rating: 4 stars

Random Things Tours: Confessions of a Crime Writer by Louise Mangos

One year after discovering Louise Mangos, I am back with her latest: Confessions of a Crime Writer, an ironic take on the publishing industry through the story of a funny and motivated crime writer in the making. 

Socially awkward Nigel has a dream of becoming a crime writer. Decided to go far beyond his sheltered life under the control of his eccentric mother he is planning step by step his literary escape. But instead of focusing on his coming bestseller, he is confronting a completely different reality as he is haunted by unexpected events from an accidental murder to a misuse of intellectual property.

Confessions... may be read as a humorous account but in the end, the tragedy is luring behind the challenges that he and some of his fellow writers are facing when confronted with the complicated requirements of the publishing industry. Publish or die, maybe, but some will really die for being published. Or killed, to be more direct.

This book, as any good book, can be read in more than one way and it is generally a pleasure for the reader. The story alongside with the characters and the philosophical meta-text(s) are coming along seamlessly, 

A recommended read for the writer and the crime lover as well.

Rating: 5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered as part of the book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own

Blue Ruin by Hari Kunzru

It was long since I´ve read something by Hari Kunzru but Blue Ruin, the last from the so-called ´colour trilogy´ - which includes also White Tears ad Red Pill, none of them I´ve read so far - come just at the right time. 

We are entering the story at the beginning of Covid, with details about the characters´ masks and their positioning shared from the first lines. Jay, a Black-British once promising rising star of the London art scene at the end of the 1990s, now an illegal food delivery driver, meets his big love Alice, 20 years after he disappearance with one of his art comrades, now her husband. Sick and weak, she invites him to temporarily stay in a cottage near the house where they were temporarily hosted during the pandemic. 

Similarly like in the Decameron, also set during a pandemic, the characters - a gallerist with a penchant for guns and his girlfriend, always on her mobile - are random, although some of them were once part of the same art clique. and their interactions may took, towards the end of the story, absurd turns. 

Jay´s musings about art - as an existential manifesto - are by far the most challenging and interesting intellectually.  The questions that Jay following the train of thought about the artist being the art. The encounter between Jay and Alice, 20 years after is fortuitous but what about if it was part of a life happening project he authored?

I´ve felt at ease in the world of ideas and art-related and artists challenges. Jay´s backstory is very rich in events and ideas, and details about clashes between clase and race, but found the rest of the story - the present tense one - less tied together, as it has a life of its own, but written in a relatively different vein.

I am clearly curious about reading the other parts of the trilogy as well as other books by Kunzru, as both his writing and his repertoire of topics are very appealing for my current literary interests.

Rating: 4 stars