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Lorenzo Sganzini, In Svizzera – Sulle tracce di Helvetia (Across Switzerland – Looking for Helvetia), 184 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-38-4
A travel novel
I will walk along three rivers, following their Swiss course, and I will try to disentangle the skein of my identity: this is the idea, at least. It will do for a start, then we’ll see.
This story begins here, at the triple watershed of mount Piz Lunghin, in the Engadin Valley: it’s the story of a journey across Switzerland; a quest for answers that can be very hard to find for someone who is born in Ticino – cut away from the rest of the country by the Alps, of course, but also by a linguistic and cultural gap. The Piz Lunghin divide is the only European watershed that leads to three different seas. The rivers that spring from it are the Meira (which flows into the Adda and into the Adriatic Sea); the Rhine (which flows into the North Sea); and the Inn (which flows through the Danube to the Black Sea) [read more]
Mario Casella, Senza scarpe (Shoeless), 184 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-37-7
A biographical novel
In this enthralling tale, the narration of Saulle Donetta merges with the reconstruction of the life of his father Roberto, a restless man, always burdened with debt. Donetta worked as farmer in the Blenio valley, but he was also a hawker of seeds, a waiter and, later, a photographer.
Roberto Donetta (1865-1932) only became known some forty years ago, thanks to the discovery of more than 5,000 photographic plates he had been taking over thirty years. Finding this treasure trove of photography, however, overshadowed another stunning discovery: almost 300 handwritten pages, in which the boisterous farmer from Blenio had jotted down his thought, copying out the literary and scientific writings that had impressed him most. Along with these personal records, dozens of letters [read more]
Fabiano Alborghetti, Corpuscoli di Krause (Krause’s corpuscles), 128 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-35-3
Poems
Krause’s corpuscles is a completely different collection from anything Fabiano Alborghetti has ever published as a volume. The usually flowery nature of his novels in verse and extensive poetic narration leaves room for a more concise work: the author, however, does not steer from his deep-rooted civic conscience, and he is never found guilty of sentimentalism or rhetorical narcissism. Alborghetti has turned the concept of [read more]
Sabina Zanini, A una voce (With One Voice), 128 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-19-3
Novel
The first novel by Sabina Zanini, With One Voice, follows the day of a character who has decided to live in complete solitude outside the mechanisms regulating contemporary society. The nameless narrating voice reflects through an interior monologue about the surrounding world, observing with detachment the aberrations of a lifestyle that she strongly disavows. Rejecting the “beliefs” of Western society and detaching herself from a consumerist logic of appearances and waste, the nameless protagonist reduces herself to a life of habits which allows her to minimise contact with the external world and escape within her own imagination. [read more]
Olimpia De Girolamo, Tutto ciò che siamo stati (All the Things that we Used to be), 128 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-36-0
Novel
A journey to Naples, a distant and ancestral place, turns into a surprising dive into the painful mysteries of a family (and of its whole neighbourhood).
All the things that we used to be by Olimpia De Girolamo is a deep and piercing reflection about childhood, relationships, oppressive social ties, and the hope for freedom.
Anna comes back to Naples after twenty years: her family needs her help to find her father, who has gone missing. The forty-year-old protagonist, who had found her peace by fleeing abroad, returns to her childhood home to find again the omnipresent people of the district (the “rione”), her mother’s harsh character, and the many unspoken words that weight upon neighbours and fellow Neapolitans. Anna will have no choice but to resurrect her violent, dormant memories, [read more]
Rosario Vitale, Sant’Onofrio e la contessa (Saint Onuphrius and the Countess), 176 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-16-2
“I think I’m on the right track. I’m in Italy, the homeland of music itself, right? I am in Naples, the city with the unsurpassed tradition. If this is not the place, then what must it be?”.
Naples, summer 1737.
Rodolfo Pimi Degli Esposti, a wealthy Paraguayan boy with a true passion for music, is finally fulfilling his lifelong dream of studying in the city with the greatest musical tradition in the world: Naples.
The young man is indeed talented, and succeeds in proving it; his mind, however, is often with Natalia, a girl he had met on the same day of his arrival by sea. Extremely poor, Natalia makes a living by telling stories in exchange for something to eat and a handful of coins. Rodolfo is fascinated by [read more]
Carlo Silini, Le ammaliatrici (The Enchantresses), 416 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-18-6
Novel
An extraordinary, visionary chronicle of the secret history of the 1600s, The Enchantresses recounts the end of an era: an archaic and savage time, ruled by love and revenge and loss, filled with the presence of two outstanding women, both saints and witches. This tale, based on solid historical foundations, unfolds at the frantic pace of a thriller, between the Swiss valleys, the Como countryside and the Duchy of Milan.
How many incredible lives have been washed away by the tide of the centuries? How many secret stories are only remembered by the mute testimony of the places they unfolded in – old taverns, decrepit chapels, ice-cold courtrooms, nunneries, asylums, umbrous valleys, the silent hollow of the caves?
With The Enchantresses, Carlo Silini offers [read more]
Gerry Mottis, Domenica Matta (Domenica Matta. Story of a Witch and her Executioner), 336 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-17-9
Novel
In his latest historical novel, Gerry Mottis tells the story of Domenica Matta: an actual woman who was tortured and sentenced to death in 1616 by the Court of Reason in Roveredo, in Italian Switzerland, as she was considered a “devilish woman” – a witch. Domenica’s case was unique, as she was tried not once, but twice: first as a child, by the Inquisitor sent by Carlo Borromeo, and then in her adult years. However, she shared her fate with many: there are archive documents in the towns of the Swiss Alps, where thousands of records of witchcraft trials are kept.
Mottis created an intense, compelling and moving story, based on the actual records of Domenica’s trial from the archives [read more]
Petros Michalopoulos, Errore dell’arte (A Fault in the Art), 280 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-12-4
Novel
Our choices create our life, but so do our mistakes.
The protagonist, a young resident doctor, dreams of a future filled with love and growth.
However, mistakes committed while dealing with key moments of his life will turn his existence upside down in a flash.
A shocking ending will change everything again.
A doctor tells the story of a younger colleague, chronicling a mistake that the protagonist of the novel will pay dearly for.
His mistake is a sort of a “fault in the art of life”. [read more]
Luca Brunoni, Indelebile (Indelible), 144 Pages, 978-88-31285-15-5
Novel
A fast-paced story recounting a quest for redemption, taking place in the so-called “Swiss Amsterdam” of the early 2000s. Gionata, a boy who lives a dangerous life on the border between law and crime, faces the resurfacing of a secret he thought he had buried forever. He risks getting into serious trouble, and he has to choose whether to defeat the ghosts of the past or let himself be dragged into a fatal whirlpool. The backdrop of his struggle is an unusual Lugano, tinted in noir.
After Silenzi (“Silences”), which won the Leggimontagna 2020 Award and is soon to be published in France, Luca Brunoni is back with a thrilling, fast-paced work: [read more]
Yari Bernasconi and Andrea Fazioli, A Zurigo, sulla luna (Zurich, on the Moon. Twelve Months in Paradeplatz), 144 Pages, ISBN 978-88-31285-14-8
Reportage
A literary reportage, following a year’s long study of Switzerland’s most famous square: Zurich’s Paradeplatz, the city’s finance hub. Writers and witnesses at the same time, the authors of this episodic story offer the tale of a surprising place: people in suits and briefcases, apparently, are much more curious than one might think… Paradeplatz, far from being merely the “square where money is made” is an intimate, wild place, every bit as fantastic as it is real.
For a whole year, a poet and a storyteller have been meeting in Zurich’s Paradeplatz in order to study whatever they would see there. For each rendezvous, they came armed with a notebook and a poem, selected for the occasion. Little did they know that the core of the Swiss finance, a place of money and wealth, brimming with suits, [read more]
Flavio Stroppini, Sotto il cielo del mondo (Under the sky of this world), 15×21 cm, 168 pp, ISBN 978-88-31285-11-7
Novel
Alvaro Giacometti has always lived a quiet, secure life in the mountain village of his childhood. One day he hears about the death of his father, whom he has not seen in decades: apparently, the man who left him to sail the seas had returned some time before, and came to live not far away from Alvaro’s village. The son decides to go and visit his late father’s house, only to find the huge model of a cargo ship – twelve meters of iron and shipyard material.
What is the meaning of that? [read more]
Bérénice Capatti, L’anno senza estate (The year without a summer), 15×21 cm, 256 pp, ISBN 978-88-31285-10-0
Novel
It is pouring down on the path leading to the foot of Mount Adula, the highest peak in Canton Ticino. Francesco Salemi, 68 years, tumbles into a ravine: the only witness of his death is the twenty-year-old Sara Gandolfi.
A successful businessman, Francesco was the owner of a cutlery company in Brianza (Lombardy), but also a passionate mountaineer. He had met Sara one year before the accident, in Milan, in the café where she worked as a waitress. The man was [read more]
Begoña Feijoo Fariña, Per una fetta di mela secca (For a shrivelled apple slice), 15×21 cm, 144 pp, ISBN 978-88-97308-90-4
Novel
From the early 40s to the early 80s, Swiss children and teenagers used to be coercively left to live with farmers, or put in an institute. Of course, the kids didn’t have a say in the decision. A huge number of children faced this unwanted fate – mostly the offspring of poor families, illegitimate children, children of dubious origin, and youths that were labelled as turbulent, stubborn or riotous. The victims of such inflicted placements were sent to work, forced to slave in the farms, committed to psychiatric institutes, jailed, abused, adopted coactively, and even sterilised without them knowing.
For a shrivelled apple slice tells the story of one of these children – Lidia Scettrini. A fictional character with a fictional name, created in order to unveil what had been not fictional at all for many actual children [read more]
Damiano Leone, Il guaritore (The Healer), 15×21 cm, 400 pp, ISBN 978-88-97308-87-4
Novel
Damiano Leone’s The Healer takes place in a not-so-distant future – an era marked by fracture and ambiguity, where the need for a dramatic change for the better is more desperate than ever. And this is where the Advanced Research Centre of Geneva steps in: thanks to the funding provided by the Vatican, a team of Swiss scientists manages to achieve the most ambitious goal – to send a man back in time. The time traveller is Mark Sachs, known as Freezer, and he is set to conduct an unprecedented mission: he has to go back to two thousand years before his time in order to verify the factual existence of Jeshua ben Yosef, eye-witness his resurrection, and ultimately come back to testify the truth to his own contemporaries. However, as soon as Mark climbs to the top of the little hill of Golgotha – the place where the dead body of Jesus of Nazareth was buried in the Sepulchre –, an unexpected twist of fate forces him to abort the mission and rush back to his present. And he does not come unaccompanied: Mark has brought a mysterious passenger back with him; a man who lay dead in his tomb a few minutes earlier, and who is now miraculously back to life. Is he the Son of God, or is he just an ordinary man? Finding the answer [read more]
Luca Brunoni, “Silenzi” (Silences), 15×21 cm, 200 pp, ISBN 978-88-97308-88-1
Novel
Silences tells the story of Ida, a thirteen years old girl that has to move from the city to an isolated mountain village; Ida carries a secret with her, but she will discovers that the village hides many more.
Described by the critics as a book that “hits like a knife and tugs at the reader’s heartstrings” (Satisfiction.eu), Silences follows in the footsteps of country noir literature (taking inspiration from Faulkner and McCarthy but also from newer authors such as Daniel Woodrell and David Joy) and brings the genre to a yet unexplored setting: a small village hidden deep in the Swiss alps.
Its powerful female protagonist, who despite an enigmatic acceptance of her cruel fate [read more]
Carlo Silini, “Latte e sangue” (Milk and Blood), 15×21 cm, 480 pp, ISBN 978-88-97308-85-0,
Novel/Historical Novel/Adventure Story,
In the murky days of the 17th century, gory events unfold on the Alpine foothills, in the lands between the Duchy of Milan and the southern bailiwicks of Switzerland. Maddalena de Buziis is the only survivor of a beastly series of abductions, rapes, and murders. The culprit is the Wizard of the Canton, a mysterious practitioner of necromancy, who has fled Vimercate for the safety of Switzerland. The story of the Wizard is told in the previous novel (The Girl Snatcher). As a traumatised Maddalena struggles to recover from her misadventure [read more]
Carlo Silini, “Il ladro di ragazze” (The Girl Snatcher), 15×21 cm, 464 pp, ISBN 978-88-97308-35-5, Novel/Historical Novel/Adventure Story, “A bold, daring, powerful story about people doomed for disaster that lived to tell the tale against all odds. Brigands and grave sages; reckless liaisons and blood-stained crimes; eye-for-an-eye justice and supernatural retaliation: what else does a novel need?” Il Giorno. Drawing inspiration from his land’s lore, Carlo Silini has brought his novel’s world to life with fictional characters and people from the actual, documented past. The Ticino of old becomes the stage of a far-reaching, relentless manhunt. But there’s also room for romance, murder, stories of brigands and nobles and peasants, betrayal and revenge – churning out a tale of horror, passion and humour. [read more]
Chiara Pelossi Angelucci, “Un’improbabile cacciatrice d’indizi. Lettere misteriose” (The clueless clue-finder. Letters of mystery)
The heroine of Chiara Pelossi Angelucci’s latest work – a novel just as amusing as the previous – is named Ilde. Like her literary predecessors, she is a funny, young woman of about thirty. Her story starts when she inherits a small detective agency – an unexpected change in her life, that leaves her quite puzzled: she is completely clueless as to how to run an agency (detective movies always make everything look so easy!), and [Read more]
Diego Bernasconi, “Lauto Grill” (Lauto Grill) – “Industrialisation” – that is, the period of change that transforms a human group from an agrarian society into an industrial one – is a word that doesn’t even make sense in a place like Sant’Eligio. Built specifically as a company town for a steel mill, it dies out when the business folds: there was never any room for a “transformation” of sort, no bucolic past on the wane.
The only legacy of the town’s fleeting existence is, ironically, a “Rural Museum”: in its utter pointlessness and in stark contrast to the blue-collar origin of Sant’Eligio, the museum becomes nonetheless a key institution, as well as the only excuse for the presence of an attendant, a police station and a police chief.
Spicing up the story is an extremely open-minded woman, an ingenious character who, unlike her dull, good-for-nothing husband, is able to fashion a brave new world full of plenty and promises. [Read more]
Alexandre Hmine “La chiave nel latte” (The key in the milk)
Novel
Winner of the 2017 Studer/Ganz Prize
“The key in the milk” tells the story of a boy of Moroccan birth who, left by his mother in the care of a Swiss widow called Elvezia, grows up in Alto Malcantone (Ticino). As the plot unfolds, shards of the protagonist’s past are brought to light: his childhood toys, the religious festivals, the hockey matches played in the road, his first crushes, and the holidays spent in Casablanca – a city that, to the eyes of the then ten-year old protagonist, looks baffling, impenetrable and distant. Although he feels a sense of belonging to Switzerland, the boy is forced to question his own indefinite identity. His doubts and confusion, shared by the reader, will be left unsolved until the end of the book.[Read more]
Damiano Leone “Il simbolo” (The symbol)
A historical novel
A little kid, a prostitute’s son, is born in a Palestine besieged by Roman troops. At the same time, another boy is born who will go down in history as Jesus of Nazareth. Their lives couldn’t be any more different, and yet they are bound to cross at the characters’ darkest hour.
Turned to prostitution, young Ben Hamir finds some solace in the affection of a slave tasked with mentoring him. Forced to flee from Palestine, after a very educational time in Athens Ben Hamir conquers Rome – or, at least, the hearts of its matrons – and becomes a much-desired guest amidst the Roman élite.
The young protagonist is introduced to the heart of Roman politics, and he ultimately becomes intimate with Tiberius himself. From this friendship, though, he learns that fate can be treacherous. When the Emperor bids him to go back to Palestine, Ben Hamir finds that a new love and an old one are waiting for him – as well as the fierce hatred of his arch-enemy, Pontius Pilate. [Read more]
Gerry Mottis “Terra bruciata” (Scorched earth)
The witches, the hangman and the devil
A historical novel
1613, Roveredo, Canton of the Grisons, Switzerland. The local hangman executes a thief in Valle Calanca. Three days later, the executioner is found dead. It’s a mystery. Without its minister of High Justice, the municipality of Mesolcina falls prey to brigands, usurers, witches and wizards that wreak havoc in the valleys. Anxious to restore order, the judicial authorities hire a new hangman from the land that border the Three Leagues.
The newly appointed minister of High Justice is a mysterious, macabre and yet bewitching character, standing at the edge of a world that is reluctant to let him in. A prostitute in Roveredo – a woman with a troubled past, but proficient in the healing arts – will present the executioner with sensations he has never felt before. Little by little, his very soul and conscience break down: is his craft even useful for human society? Are the sentences issued by the Court of the valley fair and just? [read more]
Mario Casella “Il peso delle ombre” (The burden of shadows)
Between true stories and false tales
This book is dedicated to those who have had to carry the unfair burden of lies, having been wrongly accused of being untrue; and to the liars, too. I hope these pages will help them figure out their own motives.
Some seasons are tougher than some others. Struggling as we are to stay afloat, we are unable to even think about the impact that some days, or months, or even years might have on our lives. There are crucial times, no matter how ordinary or dramatic they happen to be, that are bound to affect a person’s future forever.
[…]
I was so keen to pursue my ambitions as a mountaineer that I numbed my inquisitiveness as a journalist. I hushed my own spirit – me, the champion of human rights and freedom of speech. I left for Tibet with the bitter prospect of obeying the Chinese ban on visiting Lhasa and the other rebel cities of the province.
What’s the point of denying it? [Read more]
Giorgio Genetelli “La conta degli ostinati” (The count of the stubborn)
Short story collection
Stubbornness is the fil rouge that connects the eighteen stories in this collection.
The characters remind us of mules – stubborn, understanding, funny, smart, independent and unpredictable. But what make this fictional characters stand out is their relentless drive towards ill-fated delusions, their almost unearthly energy and nonconformism from back in the day.
Several stories take place in some undefined past, without the slightest hint of nostalgia. In fact, the past itself seems to be imbued with life and faults and strength, ready to side with us in our struggles.
The leading themes are love and death, which coalesce into everything human: from football matches to the experience of diversity, the stories lead the reader through extravagant boondocks and snow-clad squares, along impossible voyages, picaresque quests and wild adventures. [Read more]
Tommy Cappellini “Rigor mortis per Lupe” (Lupe’s rigor mortis)
Novel
“David, can you help me out with Miss Vélez’s garden tomorrow morning? Joel is taking the day off, so you’re the only one I can ask “. The life of David Donaz, a teenage boy from the 40s whose father works as a gardener for the Hollywood élite, is about to change. He’s soon to meet his first love, a woman he will never forget: Lupe Vélez, the star-crossed heroine of the Mexican Spitfire series as well as several other successful – but often forgotten – movies. Lupe, the wife of Johnny Weissmuller, was also sentimentally close to Gary Cooper and Arturo de Córdova, as well as to other famed acquaintances of hers.
The Allies landed in Normandy on June 6th, 1944; Lupe Vélez killed herself on the 13th of December of the same year, dressed in “a grand evening gown”. This charming actress, as sensual as one might expect from a beauty from San Luis Potosí, Mexico, had found herself… [Read more]
Dada Montarolo “Nessun messaggio nuovo” (No new messages)
Alex, a 40-year old architect, is terminally ill. His new state leads him to reassess three long-unsettled issues: a trivial affair cost him his love, and he never actually confronted his woman about their mutual unhappiness; his best friend and partner thinks he conned him, and won’t talk to him anymore; and his father, with whom Alex has always had a troubled relationship, has become a complete stranger. Resolved to set things right – and to keep his disease a secret – Alex starts writing e-mails to his estranged loved ones. Although none of them replies to his first, short messages, Alex’s resolution to clean up the messes in his life remains strong and… [Read more]
Virginia Helbling, Dove nascono le madri (Where mothers are born), Novel, “The novel was awarded the Studer/Ganz prize for the best first work”. Motherhood is always a powerful, unsettling experience. The main character of this novel has just become a mother; her newborn girl is sleeping close to her in her hospital cradle, and she doesn’t even know how to pick her up. She must learn how to be a mother from scratch, while helplessly witnessing her own body’s distressing change. Her domestic life gets stuck in a rut: [Read more]
Daniele Dell’Agnola, Anche i bruchi volano (Even grubs can fly), Novel, 12-year-old Felix lives in a city suburb. He’s a wild, restless, hyperactive boy, who delights in culture and hates going to school. He can’t stand Marcello Porcello, the son of his clumsy paediatrician who prescribes him huge amounts of methylphenidate. When Felix refuses to go to school, a horde of psychologists, educators, doctors and experts start analysing him. [Read more]
Mario Casella, Nero-bianco-nero. Un viaggio tra le montagne e la storia del Caucaso (Black-White-Black. A voyage in time through the Caucasian mountains), Essay/Travel report, Winner of the 2013 ITAS prize, Winner of the 2011 Leggimontagna literary prize (fiction), 9th edition, and Shortlisted for the “Exploration and Voyages” category of the 2011 Gambrinus “Giuseppe Mazzotti” prize (29th edition). After the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, the Olympic flame passed on to Sochi, a Russian city on the western edge of the Caucasus. A spotlight was thus shone on the southern border of the Russian Federation: the media started focusing on the tensions between Russia and Georgia, on the acts of terrorism in the Caucasus republics, and on the debate around the works for the Olympic Games in Sochi. Journalist and mountain guide Mario Casella, and Russian alpinist Alexey Shustrov have undertaken a journey – mostly by ski – across the boundless Caucasus… [Read more]
Mario Casella, Calendario verosimile (A likely calendar), Tales, Drawing inspiration from his bustling life experience as a mountain guide, journalist and documentarist Mario Casella has come up with the idea of a “likely calendar”, whose events take place from Siberia to the Himalayas, in America and in Europe. “No way! Are you kidding me?” is what most of us can’t help thinking when people brag about the most unlikely stories. Every story in this book might or might not be [Read more]
Oscar Matti, “The Househusband. A Day in the Life of the Modern Man”. An entertaining account of a day in the life of a man who has chosen to turn traditional family roles on their heads by becoming a househusband. With a touch of irony he tells us about everything that a househusband has to deal with: looking after the kids, getting them ready for kindergarten, breakfast, household chores, lunch, dinner (as he waits for his “working wife” to come home), [Read more]
Maria Rosaria Valentini, Antonia, Novel, I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. The language and plot are very good; its lively depiction of events, characters and places is remarkable. The twofold-perspective strategy is absolutely brilliant – two points of view that tell the same story and ultimately give the same hopeful message Giorgio Bàrberi Squarotti”. Ciarli is a sad, misanthropic geologist who spends his life telling himself the story of his family. He struggles to understand it, to piece things together in an attempt to make some sense out of the past that made him a lonely wanderer. His maze of loneliness and regret, though, can never change: Ciarli is like a spider stuck in its own cobweb. When his grandfather dies at almost 100, however, his life gets abruptly turned on its head: during the burial, Ciarli sees his long-lost cousin Antonia, a dazzling beacon in his life… [Read more]
Maria Rosaria Valentini, Di armadilli e charango… (Of armadillos and charangos…), Maria Rosaria Valentini’s work lasted for several years. When an old woman from the south told Valentini the story of her own grandmother – who was kidnapped by brigands –, she was inspired to write a collection of stories. The collection has grown far beyond expectations [Read more]
Maria Rosaria Valentini, Quattro mele annurche (Four anurkas), Four anurkas is a book that should be passed over in silence: any hint or clarification about it would mar its crystalline beauty. And yet it is a book that deserves to be talked about – maybe in subdued tones. What can we say, then? [Read more]
Flavio Stroppini, Pellegrino di cemento (The concrete pilgrim. Le Voyage d’Orient a century after Le Corbusier), A story told on the road. Le Corbusier left Berlin in 1911 and set out on a voyage that would last the whole year. He visited Germany, Bohemia, Austria, the Balkans, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Istanbul and Athens, going as far as Mount Athos. [Read more]
Flavio Stroppini, Niente salvia a maggio (No sage in May), Short Story, There’s a common saying that goes: “If you eat sage in May, you will live longer”. The title of this story refers to – and quite ironically reverses – the saying. “Amidst the whole lot of the world’s facts & numbers, on the very last page of the national press, there was a tiny agency dispatch: a suicide. A man built a guillotine in his bedroom and beheaded himself. Apparently, he managed to build it in just one day, while his family wasn’t at home. Why did he do it? I felt that man wanted to tell us something. I had to understand.” This short introduction hints strongly at the book’s leading theme [Read more]
Mattia Cavadini, Un cielo blu genziana (A gentian-blue sky), Short Story, This short story is based on the life of a luminary in Swiss culture: architect Tita Carloni. Before he died, he would often repeat something – something that left a mark on the author of this book: “There will be nothing but cement below the fog. Only animals and those who successfully adapt will survive”.[Read more]
Prisca Agustoni, Cosa resta del bianco (The remains of the white), Tales, A move; an encounter; prudent eyes peering through the night; a tropical garden; a bus stop; mysterious strangers returning to a village; an unfinished love, caught between passion, hatred and remorse; a lunatic Pole whose life is a puzzle; an aimless journey – all this is the multifarious cosmos of Prisca Agustoni’s stories. What makes these short stories unique is their language:[Read more]
Fabio Caminada, Il ponte della luna (The moon bridge), Novel, Seemingly unconscious Gianmarco starts reliving all of his memories. As a child, he was adopted by an overprotective woman who wouldn’t tell him about his past and origins. His adoptive father would basically ignore him. Anxious to spice up his drudging life, Gianmarco finds sanctuary in unrestrained behaviours. While in an institution, he becomes acquainted with Anselmo, the old, grumpy gardener, who takes [Read more]
E+C Minguzzi, Il codice della follia (The insanity code), Novel, Achilles, Althea, Hermes, Pan, Theseus – these people all come from Greek mythology, and they all have something in common: a series of heinous murders. Lake Lucerne, Switzerland. A serial killer spreads terror amidst the locals: he kills and dissects his victims and then throws them in the lake after bagging them along with some rose stems. The police suspect the residents of an expensive sanatorium headed by psychiatrist Herbert Kampitsch. On the tail of the murderer there are also [Read more]
Alessia J., Fallimento terapeutico (Therapeutic failure. A true story), Going through the pages of this book wasn’t easy. It’s the story of a painfully slow pilgrimage through hospitals, through way too many intensive-care and rehab wards. And yet it was worth asking my soul to make such an effort – and it will be worth it for you, too, if you want to be the witnesses of yet another therapeutic failure; another breakdown in healthcare provision.[Read more]
Giorgio Noseda, Una finestra nella tua casa (A window in your home. Palliative care and comfort in illness), Preface by Hans Neuenschwander, Essay, The word “palliative” comes from the Latin “pallium”, a woollen cape that ancient Romans used to wear on a shoulder and wrap around the body to protect it. In modern medical science, the word “palliative” has come to mean something else – something slightly depreciative: a palliative is a mock remedy, basically a hoax which cannot possibly cure diseases. A patient’s husband, for instance, asked us not to give his wife any “palliative care – just proper medicine, for God’s sake!”. People often forget that the word “palliative” actually refers to several cares which would be better defined as “supportive cares” and which are employed in very diverse conditions. In fact, palliative cares are [Read more]
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