Domenico Starnone's three short novels: Ties, Trick, Trust.

 - Ties is the first little novel in this group of three. It was published in 2017, followed by Trick in 2018 and Trust in 2019. The author Domenico Starnone was born in Naples and lives in Rome, and is regarded by many literary scholars as being the real Elena Ferrante, or at least a co-author (see below). He's one of Italy's most highly regarded literary authors, and has won numerous prestigious awards. The books are translated into English by noted author Jhumpa Lahiri.

- Ties is in three parts:

- Book One: The husband Aldo and his wife Vanda have been married for twelve years. They have two children, Sandro and Anna. Unfortunately he hooks up with a girl he meets, Lidia. His wife kicks him out and secures custody of the children. 

- Book Two: Aldo and Vanda, obviously reconciled, have been married for fifty-two years now, and are in their mid seventies. Their relationship, however, is like walking through a minefield. Their grown up children, Sandro and Anna, detest each other and never see each other, and also detest their parents. What a fun family! The parents, Aldo and Vanda, go for a week’s holiday and return to a trashed house. Their pet cat Labes is also missing. They don't know who trashed their house and belongings, but suspect a disgruntled neighbour. 

- As Aldo sorts through his old photos, books, and memories while cleaning up, he notices that the old photos of Lidia that he keeps hidden are missing. 

- Book Three: This is the daughter Anna’s story. She indulges in a rant to her brother Sandro blasting parenthood and children. ‘Our parents destroyed us’ she rails. The kids are burning with hate for their parents. They see clearly the nature of the marriage and the lies it's built upon. 

- There is an interesting twist at the end. Very satisfying. 

 

- Jhumpa Lahiri’s Introduction to Trick is excellent. It focuses on Henry James and Kafka and the intermeshing at play in Starnone's novel.

- Betta, Daniele Mallarico’s daughter, and her husband Saverio, both academics, need to attend a mathematics conference for a few days and ask Daniele to babysit their four year old son Mario in his old family home In Naples. He lives in Milan, is a successful illustrator, and is 75 years old. Obviously it's going to be a challenge.

- Betta and Saverio are having huge relationship problems. Betta, according to Saverio, has become attracted to the new director of the maths department. The couple snipe in front of Daniele. Typically of Neapolitans they exhibit little inhibition or class. Starnone renders them as pretty ugly types of humans. They're always arguing and things are always contentious. It's passion out of control.

- All human features, emotions and processes, are described by Starnone with exquisite precision. He builds an intensity into the seemingly quotidian.

- Daniele's anxiety about the ageing process and its debilitating consequences is front and centre. His publisher calls him as he's minding the kid to say he's not happy with his illustrations for the forthcoming deluxe edition of the Henry James book The Jolly Corner, a ghost story published in 1908, and he urgently needs him to re-do them.

- But the grandkid Mario is demanding and needs constant attention. Their playing together gets a little tedious and it goes on and on. At one point Mario locks him on the balcony. He's isolated for hours out there during a fierce storm so he gets cold and drenched. ‘Locked out’ being his old man situation in life.

- The Appendix: Offers us Daniele’s reflections on his life, his art, his obsessions, his family, Henry James’ story and its characters. It's rather unfocused and foggy, but it's honest and we see his illustrations and how ghost-like they are, and why the publisher might well see them as problematic.

 

- Teresa is twenty-three and Pietro thirty. She was his former and brilliant student in high school and she 'fell in love' with him. A few years later they become involved and decide to live together. But it's a highly dramatic and destructive relationship. Teresa in particular is hyper-intense and subject to sudden mood swings. Teresa contained a surplus of vital energy, and when she over-flowed nothing could hold her back. (Shades of My Brilliant Friend?)

- Teresa insists at one point that, to bind them forever, they disclose a deep secret about each other, one that each of them keeps hidden because it shames them. ‘The despicable part of me’ thinks Pietro. The disclosures are serious enough to undermine their relationship and they soon split up. But they never forget the vulnerability they've incurred, and the power each of them hold over the other.  

- Pietro soon meets Nadia, seduces her and marries her. She's the exact opposite of Teresa - small and quiet, but also quite beautiful. The marriage, despite its ups and downs, lasts and they have three children. 

- Pietro becomes a very successful essayist and author of books that are highly critical of Italy's public school system. He's constantly invited to give speeches and sit on panels, and he quickly learns the art of persuasive argumentation, creating slogans, phrases, and statements with appeal. He enjoys his celebrity life but Nadia resents his absences, and resents the fact she had to give up her promising academic career. 

- Over the years Pietro and his former lover Teresa keep in touch by letter writing, until one day she suddenly stops. She has moved to the US and become a highly regarded scientist and professor at MIT. 

- The final two sections of the novel are narrated by Emma, Pietro's daughter, and Teresa, now in her early seventies. Pietro is to be given a prestigious national prize for his life's work and Teresa has been invited to speak at the occasion. So the ending is a bit ominous. 

- Jhumpa Lahiri, the translator, summarises Trust and the prior two novels very nicely: It is not the final instalment of a trilogy, but certainly the third side of a triangle. All three books feature diverse first-person narrators, tense marriages, fraught relationships between parent and child. Running themes include a quest for liberty, the collision of past and present, building a career, fear, aging, anger, mediocrity, talent, and competition.

(The author of the books published under the pseudonym Elena Ferrante might be Italian author Domenico Starnone, Literary Hub reports.

In an article for the website, comparative literature scholar Elisa Sotgiu considers stylometric studies conducted by academics searching for Ferrante’s true identity. Stylometry is the analysis of literary works, using vocabulary, syntax, and other features, to try to match a text with its author.

Sotgiu concludes, “[T]hat Starnone, either alone or in partnership with his wife [translator Anita Raja], sat down and typed the novels that were published under the name of Elena Ferrante seems to be almost beyond doubt.”

Ferrante is a worldwide publishing sensation, best known for her Neapolitan Novels. The books have sold millions of copies and formed the basis for the HBO series My Brilliant Friend.

In 2016, Claudio Gatti concluded that Raja was the author behind the books, but a study by scholars last year found that Starnone, author of Ties and Trick, was most likely responsible for Ferrante’s oeuvre.

Sotgiu writes that the outcome of the studies is something of a mixed blessing but concludes, “Elena Ferrante is still a pleasure to read. And she is also the greatest literary mystery of our time.”)

Jessica Au, Cold Enough For Snow

 

- I was utterly blown away by this small, beautiful novel. It is very meditative, reflective and insightful, and a sheer joy to read. 

- The narrator and her mother travel to Japan for a holiday. They are not named, and there are no street names, train station names, hotel or restaurant names divulged. There is no localisation at all. At one point she refers to the busy Shibuya crossing, but that's it. Keeping all things hazy is the point. We know, however, that the mother is Asian, and grew up in Hong Kong, and her daughter was born in Australia. The husband/father is never mentioned. 

- The novel is written in exquisitely beautiful, clear and simple prose. It is unadorned. And, I must add, superbly designed and produced by publisher Giramondo. There are echoes of Jen Craig’s wonderful Panthers and the Museum of Fire. Time periods are blended, guided by whatever comes to mind, and thoughts dotted with companion reminders '..as I said to my mother..' The mother is less inclined to talk or reflect and the daughter withholds, though in contrast she is a very reflective person. '…I wanted to say…but I found I could not…so I said nothing…'

 - One character who is named is Laurie, her current partner. They holidayed in Japan when they were university students. We don't know what she studied at university, or what university it was. We also don't know what Australian city she grew up in. But we soon come to appreciate that all this detail is irrelevant. 

- The daughter and her mother visit an art gallery in Tokyo. There is a Monet exhibition and the mother is a bit befuddled, showing no enthusiasm at all. But the daughter is entranced. As the holiday proceeds she contemplates the meaning of art and its power. Perhaps, she reflects, this is what separates her from her mother. It isn't just generational. It's the spiritual distance between them. The author seems to be suggesting Ancient Chinese wisdom versus modern Western ‘enlightenment’. But that's probably just my pedestrian view.  

- There are many fascinating and highly meaningful episodes. She was a committed student, approaching her studies like she did every other part of her life. She was hungry to devour every book and play mentioned in her class. But all the same, I felt that there was something else, something fundamental, that I did not understand. She house-sat for her lecturer for two weeks, and when I returned home, I was, for a time, confused. 

- During their short visit to Osaka she hikes on a walk trail in Japan and stays overnight, leaving her mother in a small inn near the Osaka station. Au offers a beautiful paean to the power of nature. The deep lakes and the dangerous rapids unsettle our narrator. Water seems to be everywhere, ominous and unwelcome. It constantly rains over their three week holiday period. The trip occurs in October in Autumn. (Personally I was happy that there was no sentimental gushing about flowers and especially cherry blossoms!). 

- There are many other delightful episodes and musings packed into this 100 page gem. It's a must read.

(A note from the publisher: This book won The Novel Prize which is a biennial award for a book-length work of literary fiction written in English by published and unpublished writers around the world. The prize recognises works which explore and expand the possibilities of the form, and are innovative and imaginative in style....The prize had over 1500 submissions worldwide and Cold Enough for Snow won unanimously.) 

Melissa Manning, Smokehouse.

 

- This is good but it’s not exceptionally good, and no novel that is not exceptionally good should win a major literary prize like the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for fiction as it did, especially given the 2022 shortlist included Jennifer Down's Bodies of Light, a truly magnificent novel.

- Smokehouse is a combination of long and short stories, some strongly linked, others tangentially, and one not at all. Tellingly, in my view, versions of some of the stories have been published previously. 

- The collection is mainly about breakups and divorce and death, the fragility and transience of relationships. It's personal and intimate but it's also very quotidian. There's a profound domesticity about it. The one long story is divided into two parts which bookend the collection. Nora is the main character, and frankly, she's boring. Does she have a life outside her family and small group of friends? No. Does she work? No. Does she have views on the broad spectrum of life and society outside the family home? No. Does she read? No. No wonder she's addicted to biscuits and wine. The author even declines to tell us what year or even decade it is, other than that there's no internet or mobile phones anywhere in sight.

- The men that feature in most of the stories are very male and outdoorsy. Tom, Nora's first husband and the father of her two daughters, is very blokey indeed. He's all pubs, beers, and mates, and basically an ugly piece of shit. He travels from their Tasmanian country town to Sydney all the time ‘on business’ (yeah, right!). Nora is left to suffer the suffocating small town experience.

- Eventually she starts an affair with Ollie, a neighbour and owner of a smokehouse, then tells Tom she wants to leave. Of course Tom, true to form, kicks her out and won’t let her see her daughters at all. Until eventually shared custody is legally granted.

- Most of the other stories are very short and slight, providing a bit of background information on Nora's neighbours. One of the stories, however, Chainsaw, is powerful, and another one, Nao, actually focuses on a major world event. Refreshing. 

Thomas Piketty, Time For Socialism

 

- I've been an enthusiastic fan of French economist Thomas Piketty ever since his bestselling Capital in the Twenty-First Century was released in 2013. It was a remarkable tome, a totally absorbing 700 pages read. It galvanised global debate about inequality. He followed that blockbuster up with another one, Capital and Ideology in 2020. That was a far more difficult and rather tiresome read, mainly for academic economists. 

- His newest release however, Time For Socialism, is much more accessible. It is a collection of his articles published over the last five years in the French newspaper Le Monde. Its subtitle is Dispatches from a World on Fire, 2016-2021.

- The blurb inside the dust jacket summarises it well: Piketty argues that the time has come to support an inclusive and expansive conception of socialism as a counterweight against the hyper-capitalism that defines our current economic ideology. 

- What I found refreshing was his critique of the radical path capitalism has taken over the last fifty years in America and throughout the West, including Australia - the removal of government power and control from the marketplace; the massive lowering of personal and corporate tax rates thus requiring substantial cutbacks in government spending; the abolition of property and inheritance taxes, and more. The result has been a huge increase in inequality and poverty, and government services that are starved of sufficient funding. (Our current Australian government's fetish for maintaining a taxing and spending ratio to GDP of 24% is a case in point. It's infantile.)

- I skimmed quite a few of the pieces that concentrated on French issues, and Macron's failures in particular. But the majority are focussed on the US economy under Trump, and the issues surrounding the 2020 election. Piketty is not so much a fan of Biden. He's a Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren enthusiast.

- There are tables and charts littered throughout and they're very enlightening. 

- He's a clear thinker, an excellent communicator, and this book, like his others, is well translated into English.

- Highly recommended if you're at all interested in our current economic and social challenges.

- (By the way, Australia would be a far more prosperous and egalitarian nation if our tax/spend ratio was 30%).  

 

Elizabeth Strout, Oh William!

- This is a delightful book and such a pleasure to read. Lucy Barton, an author, is telling the story of her former husband William, who she is still very fond of. Lucy was William’s first wife and they had two daughters. They divorced after twenty years and William married twice more. Lucy also remarried but her new husband David died after seven years. It's a drama of parenthood, childhood and marriage.

- Lucy’s writing style is quirky and light. She has a certain flavour which is always on show. …is what I mean is common, as is so there was that. 

- Catherine was William’s mother. She was a lovely person but with a complicated past. She had a daughter, Lois, from a prior marriage, which she never disclosed because, shamefully, she deserted her after just twelve months. She later married a former Nazi soldier now a US citizen. Their son William became an academic microbiologist and has a rather cold and restrained personality. He was never told about Lois, his stepsister. 

- Halfway through this short novel I wondered whether it is was all a little trite. Every person on earth has dramas in their lives - marriage issues, kids and wider family issues, wrong decisions made, ambitions unfulfilled, careers gone nowhere, etc, etc. There is no big stuff in this story - no crime, no rape, no sexual abuse, no drugs, no school expulsions, no sackings, or anything extra significant.

- According to Lucy William had 'authority', and that's what attracted her. ‘We crave authority’ she writes. 

-The story of Lois is eventually told. Lucy and William travel to the small town to meet her, but she will only talk to Lucy. She's turned out to be a lovely and generous person.

- Lucy's meanderings go on and on but her final realisation is important to her: …in this whole wide world, we do not know anybody, not even ourselves...We are all mythologies, mysterious. We are all mysteries, is what I mean.

Amor Towles, The Lincoln Highway

 

- I have to say this - I'm so sick of thick, brick-like books. Why are so many novels these days over 600 pages? The problem is unless the prose is captivating or the narrative exhilarating you're wasting days of your life.

- After thoroughly enjoying Amor Towles' last novel A Gentleman in Moscow I was really looking forward to this one. It would surely be a perfect January read. 

- Well it wasn't. Towles has written a classic American story in the tradition of Mark Twain. It's a bit The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, a very modern YA trope. The hero, Billy, is a very likeable and sympathetic boy, as is his older brother Emmett. They embark on a road trip across America in search of their missing mother and father. Odd characters are met along the way. 

- As a narrative style road trips are generally a pain in the arse. New characters keep popping up, unconnected things keep happening, etc. All the characters are wanderers and lost souls, or innocents who've been wronged. They're seeking connection or they're seeking retribution. Every bit of evidence would suggest that the will to be moving is as old as mankind.

- Towles imbues this tale with a very patriotic, American tone. He takes every opportunity to celebrate America's heroes and founding principles. The boy Billy is captivated by American history, especially Abraham Lincoln and the Declaration of Independence. The fourth of July is of particular significance.   

- Of course there is a lot of charm in this novel. It's saccharine-like, piled on and on. Although there is violence and tragedy sprinkled throughout, the sentimentality rules supreme.

- Read something else. 

Colm Toibin, The Magician

 

- I've long been a great fan of Irish writer Colm Toibin. He never disappoints. His writing is subtle and sensitive, and his characters and their lives and times are brought vividly to life. He never shies away from exploring the sexual, social and political stresses and strains that matter in any person's universe. 

- His latest novel, The Magician, is quite simply one of his best. It is just magnificent. Its focus is the career of Nobel Prize winning German novelist Thomas Mann and his large and supremely talented family.

- Mann was born in Germany in 1875 and died in 1955. He lived through the First World War and the subsequent rise of fascism in Germany in the following decades, leading of course to Hitler's rise, his vicious Nazi regime, and the Second World War and its aftermath. 

- Mann was a scholar of German art, music, literature and culture, and highly lauded in Germany and around the world for his fairness, generosity and insights. He found himself torn however by what Germany was becoming between the wars and through his books, essays and speeches made many powerful enemies in the process.  

- Over the years he and his family were forced to flee to France, Switzerland, and eventually the United States. After Hitler's defeat and the establishment of East Germany ruled by communists, life in the US also became impossible because of his refusal to condemn the communist regime. He and his family were continually pestered by US officials, particularly the FBI.

- Mann's famous novella Death in Venice about an older gentleman's sexual attraction to a young man he encounters during a beach holiday, mirrored Mann's personal struggle with his sexuality, and Toibin very deftly describes this longing that tormented him throughout his life.

- Mann's wife and children were all passionate and well known anti-fascist writers, artists and celebrities all through their lives. Toibin's depiction of their dinners and debates is exhilarating. 

- This all makes for an engrossing read. Highly recommended.