In the 1990s, deep in the Maiella mountains of Central Italy, a brutal crime shatters the peace of the local community. Two young women are murdered, a third left for dead. Lucia is twenty years old back, and the only survivor is her best friend. Now, Lucia is a physiotherapist, separating from her husband, her daughter Amanda studying in Milan. When the pandemic forces Amanda to return to the family's home near Pescara, Lucia's memories are reawakened, and with them the impact of past trauma.
It’s debatable whether Ms. Di Pietrantonio brings the disparate elements of this novel together in a cohesive and satisfying manner, but her chronicle of the crimes and their punishment is set forth with the grim authority of a true-crime classic.
Both a thriller and an absorbing exploration of evolving Italian values ... Translation is fraught with such choices and nuances. Ann Goldstein’s method, which is generally to stick very close to Italian vocabulary and syntax, complicates this otherwise rewarding read. There are some unusual word choices (a sheep has “breasts” rather than “udders”) and sentences that seem oddly inverted. That said, Goldstein’s translations of books by Elena Ferrante, herself an admirer of Di Pietrantonio, have been hugely successful, and Di Pietrantonio deserves success, too, for this intricate and subtle novel.
Gripping, chilling ... There is much bleakness here, but also hope. The author dedicates her novel to ‘all the women who survive’; and in pairing the stories of mother and daughter struggling to overcome men’s violent acts, she urges a solidarity between women, rather than a splintering.
