A review by saltydough
The Telling Room: A Tale of Love, Betrayal, Revenge, and the World's Greatest Piece of Cheese by Michael Paterniti

adventurous emotional hopeful informative reflective slow-paced

4.0

Paterniti is obviously a great writer, and I enjoyed seeing him flex his descriptive muscles in this book. I also appreciated the bits and bobs of Spanish history and culture that he dropped in there. The Goya painting allegory was particularly effective. The only complaint I have was that he spent far too much time romanticizing Ambrosio and Guzman, and far too little time walking that perspective back. I would've liked to see more disillusionment on his part, and I think the conclusion he comes to isn't really satisfying. It's clear that he was still under Ambrosio's weird masculine spell.