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aliciae08's review
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.75
The writing/ Ann Goldstein’s translation was beautifully crafted. The story follows a girl as she’s returned to a family she never knew existed from the only family she’s ever known for some unknown reason.
She struggles with belonging and what it means to have/be a mother when both of hers have disappointed her. This follows this confused connection, while also showing points of hope in sisterhood.
There is an uncomfortable moment of incestuous SA that was sure to get worse, however, the girl hasn’t quite understood the impact of what was happening to her.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Incest and Death
onethousandoddfrogs's review
emotional
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Abandonment, Grief, Incest, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Child abuse, Classism, Domestic abuse, and Child death
Minor: Violence, Racism, Alcohol, Cursing, Infertility, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Sexual content, Racial slurs, Infidelity, and Suicidal thoughts
sofireads8's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Car accident
Moderate: Violence
Minor: Miscarriage
strrygo's review
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
another vanity pick..idc..i love this cover ! whirlwind of emotions. can't fully understand why maybe it was that the chapters got longer and longer, so i felt like i was being allowed in more, somehow, the super distinct prose/voice that felt so much more personal? than i think i'm used to balancing simplicity and beauty, but i cared! so so much! almost like i was experiencing her anger and grief and joy(however brief) with her, so much so i couldn't put it down because i felt like my not reading to the end was holding her back from a resolution..parasocial reading..
book i would love to own and mark up bc some of these quotes r so completely stuck to my brain!
book i would love to own and mark up bc some of these quotes r so completely stuck to my brain!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Incest, Child abuse, and Death
kirstym25's review against another edition
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Incest, Death, and Abandonment
Moderate: Infertility, Child abuse, Infidelity, and Racism
theportalmaster's review
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Abandonment, and Grief
Minor: Incest
wabisabigio's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.25
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child abuse and Death
xbernadette's review
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Incest, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, Abandonment, Grief, and Child death
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Infertility, Bullying, Car accident, Child death, Death, Infidelity, Incest, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Classism, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Religious bigotry, and Ableism
Minor: Racial slurs, Racism, and Injury/Injury detail
bookish_wanderer's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
nini23's review
5.0
A perfect little novella encapsulating so much within. Originally published in Italian as L'Arminuta, this is Donatella Di Pietrantonio's third novel which won the 2017 Premio Campiello and has been adapted into a film of the same title by Giuseppe Bonito. The English translation in 2019 is superbly done by Ann Goldstein, from Europa Editions.
So L'Arminuta in the Abbruzzese dialect of Italy (from the Abruzzo region) means 'the returned' ("la ritornata") and is the moniker/nickname that our unnamed adolescent narrator is saddled with. Without rhyme or reason, she has been uprooted from her seaside home and family she grew up in and 'returned' to her birth family. We feel her bewilderment, hurt, disorientation, rage as she tries to bargain and wheedle with her 'father' into bringing her back, constructing elaborate scenarios for the reasons her sick 'mother' had to let her go.
In time I lost that confused idea of normality, too, and today I don't really what place a mother is. It's absent from my life the way good health, shelter, certainty can be absent. It's an enduring emptiness, which I know and can't get past. My head whirls if I look inside it. A desolate landscape that keeps you from sleeping at night and constructs nightmares in the little sleep it allows. The only mother I never lost is the one of my fears.
Donatella Di Pietrantonio's writing is often compared to Elena Ferrante's (and they have the same English translator for their books). I can see why, given they're both Italian novelists who write about Italian adolescents grappling with the inexplicable adult world but that's where to me the similarities end. In Ferrante's world, there's florid technicolor strokes with telenovela melodrama whereas with Di Pietrantonio, it's carefully controlled, coiled evocative minimalist framing. She manages to paint a scene, evoke the mood, plumb the inner world of her characters with a few choice words leaving our imagination and reasoning to fill out the rest. I was transfixed by this world she created, following the journey of our obstinate narrator and her growing relationship with her sister Adriana in her impoverished large family.
Motherhood in all its meanings is also thoughtfully examined: I softly repeated the word mamma a hundred times, until it lost all meaning and was only an exercise of the lips. I was an orphan with two living mothers. One had given me up with her milk still on my tongue, the other had given me back at the age of thirteen. I was a child of separations, false or unspoken kinships, distances.
I really like this reflective review https://readingintranslation.com/2019/08/19/the-mother-of-all-questions-donatella-di-pietrantonios-a-girl-returned-translated-from-italian-by-ann-goldstein/ on the Reading In Translation website by Barbara Halla.
The sequel to this - A Sister's Story - is upcoming in April 2022 also translated by Ann Goldstein, it'll be about Adriana and I can't wait! Thanks too to Storygraph friend LibbysBookShelf for reviewing this book and rousing my interest.
So L'Arminuta in the Abbruzzese dialect of Italy (from the Abruzzo region) means 'the returned' ("la ritornata") and is the moniker/nickname that our unnamed adolescent narrator is saddled with. Without rhyme or reason, she has been uprooted from her seaside home and family she grew up in and 'returned' to her birth family. We feel her bewilderment, hurt, disorientation, rage as she tries to bargain and wheedle with her 'father' into bringing her back, constructing elaborate scenarios for the reasons her sick 'mother' had to let her go.
In time I lost that confused idea of normality, too, and today I don't really what place a mother is. It's absent from my life the way good health, shelter, certainty can be absent. It's an enduring emptiness, which I know and can't get past. My head whirls if I look inside it. A desolate landscape that keeps you from sleeping at night and constructs nightmares in the little sleep it allows. The only mother I never lost is the one of my fears.
Donatella Di Pietrantonio's writing is often compared to Elena Ferrante's (and they have the same English translator for their books). I can see why, given they're both Italian novelists who write about Italian adolescents grappling with the inexplicable adult world but that's where to me the similarities end. In Ferrante's world, there's florid technicolor strokes with telenovela melodrama whereas with Di Pietrantonio, it's carefully controlled, coiled evocative minimalist framing. She manages to paint a scene, evoke the mood, plumb the inner world of her characters with a few choice words leaving our imagination and reasoning to fill out the rest. I was transfixed by this world she created, following the journey of our obstinate narrator and her growing relationship with her sister Adriana in her impoverished large family.
Motherhood in all its meanings is also thoughtfully examined: I softly repeated the word mamma a hundred times, until it lost all meaning and was only an exercise of the lips. I was an orphan with two living mothers. One had given me up with her milk still on my tongue, the other had given me back at the age of thirteen. I was a child of separations, false or unspoken kinships, distances.
I really like this reflective review https://readingintranslation.com/2019/08/19/the-mother-of-all-questions-donatella-di-pietrantonios-a-girl-returned-translated-from-italian-by-ann-goldstein/ on the Reading In Translation website by Barbara Halla.
The sequel to this - A Sister's Story - is upcoming in April 2022 also translated by Ann Goldstein, it'll be about Adriana and I can't wait! Thanks too to Storygraph friend LibbysBookShelf for reviewing this book and rousing my interest.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abandonment and Grief
Moderate: Death
Minor: Physical abuse