From The Story of the Lost Child, the fourth - and final - installment of the Neapolitan novels:
I've given no background about the novels, but, in brief, they trace the friendship of two women over fifty years. And while the friendship is the heart of the series, the novels also explore class struggles, female identity, the complexities of motherhood, the impact of communism on Italy, the violence of Naples, and what feels like dozens and dozens of other themes.
And though I grimace at the Trump-like overtones of the word, I can only describe the books as being tremendous. Highly recommended!
Two additional thoughts:
"It was marvelous to cross borders, to let oneself go within other cultures, discover the provisional nature of what I had taken for absolute."Also:
"Every intense relationship between human beings is full of traps, and if you want it to endure you have to learn to avoid them."And so I'm done with the series. I deliberately waited to start the novels until I gave birth -- among other things, I wanted to read them without interruption (ha!). Finishing the series feels especially poignant, coinciding with the end of the so-called fourth trimester.
I've given no background about the novels, but, in brief, they trace the friendship of two women over fifty years. And while the friendship is the heart of the series, the novels also explore class struggles, female identity, the complexities of motherhood, the impact of communism on Italy, the violence of Naples, and what feels like dozens and dozens of other themes.
And though I grimace at the Trump-like overtones of the word, I can only describe the books as being tremendous. Highly recommended!
Two additional thoughts:
- Its scope reminds me a bit of A Suitable Boy, which I also highly recommend.
- Though Ferrante is a pseudonym and the author's identity remains unknown, we all think that the author is a female... right?
