Stefano Beretta Books

La complessa e profonda amicizia tra un fisico e uno storico, due studiosi legati da percorsi simili e da una grande passione comune: la musica. Un violino e un pianoforte, la politica e il sentimento; sullo sfondo un’immaginaria Inghilterra retta da un regime totalitario. Tra questi elementi si snoda la tensione del giallo: i due protagonisti vengono sottoposti a indagine perché, in modi diversi, potrebbero essere considerati "sovversivi". Le loro vite e la loro amicizia cambieranno per sempre. Dietro questa storia, il narratore ne lascia affiorare un’altra, quella che parla della sua stessa vita, degli anni del suo esilio, del suo matrimonio senza amore, del tentativo fallito di scrivere un romanzo.

"An emotional novel about motherhood--about a woman who has never thought she wanted to become a mother, and how she does or does not decide to go ahead and have a child"--

A gripping, sinister Gothic tale inspired by and in the tradition of Henry James's The Turn of the Screw  In 1891, in a remote and crumbling New England mansion, 12-year-old orphan Florence and her younger brother are neglected by her guardian uncle. Banned from reading, Florence devours books in secret and talks to herself?and narrates her story?in a unique language of her own invention. By night, she sleepwalks the corridors and is troubled by a recurrent dream in which a mysterious woman appears to threaten her younger brother Giles. After the sudden violent death of the children's first governess, a second teacher, Miss Taylor, arrives, and immediately strange phenomena begin to occur. Florence becomes convinced that the new governess is a malevolent spirit who means to do Giles harm. Against this powerful enemy, Florence must use all her intelligence and ingenuity to protect her little brother and preserve her private world. This gothic page-turner in the tradition of The Woman in Black and The Fall of the House of Usher is told in a startlingly different and wonderfully captivating narrative voice.

TWO LIVES tells the remarkable story of Seth's great uncle and aunt. His great uncle Shanti left India for medical school in Berlin in the 1930s and lodged with a German Jewish family. In the household was a daughter, Henny, who urged her mother 'not to take the blackie'. But a friendship developed and each managed to leave Germany and found their way to Britain as the Nazis rose to power. Shanti joined the army and lost his right arm at the battle of Monte Cassino, while Henny (whose family were to die in the camps) made a life for herself in her adopted country. After the war they married and lived the emigre life in north London where Shanti, despite the loss of his arm, became a much-loved dentist. During his own adolescence in England, Vikram Seth lived with Shanti and Henny and came to know and love them deeply. His is the third life in this story of TWO LIVES. This is also a book about history, encompassing as it does many of the most significant themes and events in the 20th century, whose currents are reflected in the lives of Shanti, Henny and their family: from the Raj and the Indian freedom movement to the Third Reich, the Holocaust and British postwar society.