Bancarella Award 2023, wins Francesca Giannone-Corriere.it

Francesca Giannone is the winner of Bancarella Award 2023 with the novel The Postman, published by North. The announcement of the winner of the 71st edition of the Bancarella Award took place on Sunday 16 July, in Piazza della Repubblica, in Pontremoli (Massa Carrara). The Postman is a novel that takes inspiration from the writer’s family history, in particular from the story of her great-grandmother, the first postwoman of Salento. Pugliese, Giannone after graduating in Communication Sciences, has studied cinema at the experimental center of cinematography in Rome; she attended the writing course of the «Fictions» Storytelling Workshop

The other finalists were: The year of words found Of Bea Buozzi (Morellini Editore), «cronoromanzo», a book that intertwines invented events with real events in the year 2022; the noir The king of memory Of Massimo Cotto (Gallucci publisher), a story of pain and ghosts of the past; the historical thriller The Fifth Seal Of David Cossu (Newton Compton), set in fifteenth-century Florence, built around a crime investigated by the architect Leon Battista Alberti; The distractions Of Federica de Paolis (HarperCollins Italia), which investigates family relationships through the story of the disappearance of a child; And Gabriel Of Sandro Neri (Hoepli), which outlines the figure of the singer-songwriter Giorgio Gaber. In 2022 the Bancarella Prize was won by Stefania Auci, with the novel The Winter of the Lionsalso published by Editrice Nord.

The evening was hosted by the journalist Monica Marangoni to which the finalists talked about themselves and introduced the themes of their books; the musical accompaniment was by The Niro, stage name of the musician Davide Combusti, who dedicated a song to each finalist.

The winner obtained the highest number of preferences from the jury, and received the work Saint John of God, special protector of booksellers, ceramic made by Umberto Piombino. During the evening in Pontremoli, the notary in charge, Dr. Sara Rivieri had proceeded with the counting in public session of the ballots that the independent booksellers had voted for. A total of 179 ballots arrived, each containing three votes; 150 were opened with silent ballots while the last 29 ballots were opened live in front of the public.

These the obtained preferences: Francesca Giannone 172 preferences, Massimo Cotto 86, Davide Cossu 79, Bea Buozzi 72, Sandro Neri 72 and Federica de Paolis 53.

The prize, organized by the Città del Libro Foundation chaired by Ignazio Landi and by the Unions of Pontremoli Booksellers and of the Bancarelle, is among the most important and popular in Italy. Alongside the Bancarella Award, other special awards, the Gerle d’Oro, were also delivered on July 16 during the evening: to Giulia Faggian, wife of Marco Mattioli, commercial director of numerous national publishing houses; then to the booksellers Davide Giovannacci, of Biella; Giorgio Tarantola, of Sesto San Giovanni (Milan); and Alessia Panassi, whose bookstores are present in Val di Susa.

Among past winners of the Bancarella Prize Ernest Hemingway with The old Man and the Sea for Mondadori which prevailed in the first edition of 1953, then Boris Pasternak in 1958 with Doctor Zhivago (Feltrinelli), Umberto Eco in 1989 with Foucault’s pendulum (Bompiani), Elizabeth Strout in 2010 with Olive Kitteridge (Fazi).

Finally, the Olympic champion Sara Simeoni is the winner of the sixtieth edition of the Bancarella Sport award. The blue jumper, unforgotten gold at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, received the prestigious award for A life above, published by Rai Libri, co-written with the journalist Marco Franzelli. Sara Simeoni prevailed with a gap of 15 votes over Bruno Conti, author together with Giammarco Menga of the book A breeze (Rizzoli). Instead, he finished third A team (Fandago Libri) by Domenico Procacci followed by The new wars of football (Feltrinelli) by Marco Bellinazzo, Giuliano Giuliani, more alone than a goalkeeper (66thhand2nd publisher) by Paolo Tomaselli e Chris Amon. Bad luck doesn’t exist» (Minerva) by Emiliano Tozzi.