Nives

by Sacha Naspini, Clarissa Botsford (Translator)

Overview

Shortlisted for the 2022 Italian Prose in Translation Award

One of the most exciting new voices in Italian literature brings to life a hauntingly beautiful story of undying love, loss, and resilience, and a fierce, unforgettable new heroine

Meet Nives: widow, Tuscan through-and-through, survivor. Nives has recently lost her husband of fifty years. She didn’t cry when she found him dead in the pig pen, she didn’t cry at the funeral, but now loneliness has set in. When she decides to bring her favorite chicken inside for company, she is shocked, confused, and a little bit guilty to discover that the chicken’s company is a more than adequate replacement for her dead husband.

But one day, Giacomina goes stiff in front of the tv. Unable to rouse the paralyzed chicken, Nives has no choice but to call the town veterinarian, Loriano Bottai, an old acquaintance of hers. What follows is a phone call that seems to last a lifetime, a phone call that becomes a novel. Their conversation veers from the chicken to the past—to the life they once shared, the secrets they never had the courage to reveal, wounds that never healed.

Nives reverberates with the kinds of stories we tell ourselves at night when we cannot sleep: stories of love lost, of abandonment, of silent and heart-breaking nostalgia, of joy, laughter, and despair. With delicate yet sharp prose and raw, astonishing honesty, Sacha Naspini bravely explores the core of our shared humanity.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781609456665
Publisher:	Europa Editions, Incorporated
Publication date:	05/04/2021
Pages:	144
Sales rank:	1,123,482
Product dimensions:	5.30(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Sacha Naspini was born in 1976 in Grosseto, a town in Southern Tuscany. He has worked as an editor, art director, and screenwriter, and is the author of numerous novels and short stories which have been translated into several languages. Nives is his first novel to appear in English.

Clarissa Botsford studied Italian at Cambridge and Comparative Education in London. She currently teaches English and Translation Studies at Roma Tre University. Her translations from the Italian include Sworn Virgin by Elvira Dones, The Game by Alessandro Baricco, and the prose poems of Valerio Magrelli.

Editorial Reviews

The dramatic concision of this story in tandem with its wide scope reminded me of Edith Wharton…Emotions whiplash and the most unexpected of secrets and epiphanies emerge... This delightful and affecting novella affirms the truth of Emily Dickinson’s famous line: ‘Hope is the thing with feathers’.”—Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air

“Touching, heartfelt... Nives is the reckoning of a woman blindsided by the unexpected. Fans of Elisabeth Egan, Marian Keyes, and Isabel Allende will appreciate the care and compassion Naspini takes with Nives’ journey of self-awareness, self-reliance, and self-acceptance. A delightful story of the muddled, confusing time of love after loss.”—Stephanie Turza, Booklist

“A slim, sharply pointed knife of a novel.”—Kirkus Reviews

“[Nives] inspires readers to tell our stories with humor, passion, and gratitude.”—Mari’s Book Reviews

“Truly surprising.”—Complete Review

“As immediate and spellbinding as a two-character play…Naspini is excellent at conjuring characters and situations.“—La Stampa

“Nives carries a powerful message of female emancipation: it’s impossible not to root for the title character as she reclaims her place in the world after a whole life spent in men’s shadow.”—Critica Letteraria

From the Publisher

2021-02-10
A recently widowed Italian farm wife spends a long night on the phone with her local veterinarian.

With its dependence on dialogue and rising tension as revelations about the characters’ pasts build toward a present-moment crisis, Naspini's short novel feels like a two-character play. The usually resilient 66-year-old Nives falls into despair when her husband of many years dies unexpectedly. Rebuffing a suggestion to leave the farm and move in with her daughter’s family in France, Nives suffers debilitating loneliness until she brings Giacomina, a chicken, into the house for company. Then Giacomina becomes paralyzed, and panicky Nives calls old acquaintance Loriano Bottai for veterinary advice. Once Bottai’s wife, Donatella, rouses the alcoholic vet and goes to bed, Nives and Bottai settle in to what becomes a verbal marathon. Their argument about the chicken’s condition leads to banter about Donatella’s snoring, so loud Nives can hear it over the phone. When Bottai mentions that his upstairs neighbor, Pagliuchi, hears Donatella too, the banter becomes gossip about Pagliuchi’s long-ago youthful affair with Rosa, a girl who threw herself from the church belfry. Nives ponders what it must be like for Pagliuchi, “living with death on [his] conscience,” but reveals that she, as well as Donatella, had problematic relationships as an adolescent with both Pagliuchi and Rosa. While Nives talks in concrete terms about Rosa’s ghost cursing them, Bottai sees Rosa as a metaphor for “that thing we all have, which sometimes keeps us awake at night"—a night Bottai and Nives are sharing as they bring up one “Rosa” after another whom they hurt or were hurt by. The two are by turns friendly and hostile, with each revelation shifting who dominates the conversation. Then, midway through, Nives declares that part of her was “massacred” more than 30 years ago, and it becomes clear that Nives and Bottai are each other’s main “Rosas,” cursed with love, resentment, vengeance, cowardice, and guilt.

A slim, sharply pointed knife of a novel.

Kirkus Reviews