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Originally Posted by mungo
Is this section just about books on Italy? Or can any book be reviewed here?
The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje is very good. I read it in a cold climate and felt hot.
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Why not, fantastic book, one of the best Booker prize winners ever, possibly one of my all time personal favourites, and it merits a place here anyway surely as it's partly set in Italy. So long as you begin by acknowledging that the film is only very, very loosely based on the book, that's enjoyable too. Wonderful locations (Sant'Anna in Camprenna just up the road, for example) and some first rate performances. Hannah's face when Kip pulls the rope and she's yanked up to see the frescoes supposedly at Arezzo. Catherine telling stories in the desert. Magical. Don't think I have it on DVD otherwise I'd watch it tonight, drat.
Thankfully we don't live in Montepul itself but I have a friend who does (small apartment just off the Corso) and it drives her barmy in summer. I think I posted once before that she comes down to find Japanese tourists sitting on her front doorstep eating ice cream. It's like a human tidal wave of people flowing up and down the narrow street, late into the evening too. I won't go there this time of year and we agree to meet somewhere "civilised" like Cetona.
Re Montalcino, tried to get there a couple of weeks ago, needed some crockery and there's a fab kitchen shop. Arrived mid morning to find tourist policeman on edge of town not even allowing anyone else up the road. He directed us to a carpark that was a couple of kilometres away! Blow that, new plates can wait until October! V