A lyrical novel concerning belonging, foreignness, and ethnicity.
Following the path of her late geneticist husband, Laure arrives in the
town of Malaterra in the harsh mountains of Abruzzo in Italy, where her
husband was studying the close-knit Albanian inhabitants. At first an
intruder, she is gradually accepted by the population, which is made up
of amusing, eccentric characters. Among them: Helena, who hanged her
dishonored daughter from the fig tree in her garden, and who has been
waiting for thirty years with her gun for her daughter's rapist to
return; the Kosovar, a distrusted bookseller languishing in his dusty
shop; Mourad, the baker, who proposes marriage to Laure and every other
woman who enters his bakery; and Yussuf, the postman, who makes his
rounds even if there is no mail to deliver. We also meet the unfortunate
assailant who returns from his exile to reclaim and restore his family
home. With humor and compassion, this book brings to life the
inhabitants of a small, remote town in the mountains of Abruzzo.