the new novel by Donato Carrisi- Corriere.it

Peter Gerber he had died on the first Monday of July, around ten thirty of a hot summer morning.
Yet that event would have represented just an episode in the final count of his life. Over time he would be reduced to the fleeting consistency of an anecdote to be cataloged in his memory along with many others. It was even wrong to call it “a memory”, since Pietro Gerber would have remembered very little of that moment.

Only the details that preceded the fatal event. The lilac room on the first floor of the villa in Porto Ercole. The scent of lavender. The bed made. The wide open window on the garden, with the lace curtains floating like ghosts towards the blue sky. That kind of groan emitted from his worn tennis shoes on the terracotta tiles, while he ran to take refuge on the balcony, chased by a horde of peers determined to capture him to end the game. Sweat dripping from his hairline onto his hot cheeks as he crossed the room. The salty taste of the droplets that ended up in his mouth. The breathlessness and the unaware smile that lit up his face as he turned for a moment to check the pursuers at his heels. The shorts. Pikachu’s faded shirt. The scabs on the knees from too many falls on a bicycle. Tanned skin. The flavor of rosemary hidden in the summer air.

The lightheartedness of his parents eleven years, three months, sixteen days, ten hours, twenty-nine minutes and a few seconds.
His arms stretched out towards the wrought iron balustrade which, according to his predictions, will have the task of slowing down his run. The railing which seems to carry out that task properly as soon as Pietro leans on it with his whole body, but which then undulates unexpectedly, as if it were made of rubber. And absurdly she, rebelling against the immobility she has been forced to for decades, she disengages herself from the wall of the old house, starting a journey into the unknown as if he felt able to disprove the force of gravity and even to fly. The wreck of metal that drags him with all its weight into the abyss, while he still holds on to it. The child’s smile that fades on his face as they sink together into the void. Eyes that fill with terror when they see the white gravel of the garden approaching quickly. The blow of the impact, which one expects similar to a thunderous explosion, but which instead is only the dark and clear sound of something breaking and preceding darkness.

Yet, going backwards, the summer day of 1997 had begun in the best way for the young Pietro. Cousin Maurizio had come to the sea to be with him, his father and Adele, the housekeeper who took care of them. Pietro had lost his mother before he was two years old and his father had never remarried.

(© Donato Carrisi 2022 Longanesi & C. © 2022 – Milan)

Meetings with the author

Donato Carrisi’s novel “The house of lights” (Longanesi, pp. 400, and 23) is released on Tuesday 8 November. The author presents the book in preview on Monday 7 at 19 online at LibrerieLive, on Illi February.it. Carrisi has created a special path for images, videos and words on the themes of the book. In November it will be Saturday 12 (12 noon) in Rome, at the New Europe Library, I Granai; and Monday 14 in Novara, at the Circolo dei Lectors (6pm), and in Turin, Circolo dei Lettere (Lectors Club) (9pm). And again on the 20th (6pm) at Bookcity Milano, the Triennale’s Hall of Honor; 22nd: in San Donà di Piave (Ve), at the Mo-derna bookstore (6 pm) and in Treviso, at the Cano-va bookstore (8.30 pm); on the 26th (5 pm) in Varese, in the Montanari Room. In December presentations in Florence (1), Reggio Emilia (4) and Bari (14).