{"product_id":"swimming-to-elba-isbn-9780143123651","title":"Swimming to Elba","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe provocative international bestseller about two young girls growing up fast in a failing industrial town on the coast of Italy \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThey were always a pair: daring, intelligent Anna and breathtakingly gorgeous Francesca. Just shy of fourteen, their newly acquired curves and skimpy bathing suits have earned them celebrity status on the beaches of their gritty town, where the glittering resort island of Elba taunts them from across the bay. The girls, aware of their newfound power, are on the brink of everything—high school, adulthood, ambition—but when their intense friendship suffers a blow, each sets off on her own, only to learn that the \"glamorous\" world of adult physicality can be at best banal and at worst dehumanizing. As their choices take them to a painful crossroads, the girls must reconnect if they have any hope of escaping their small-town destinies.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e            Frank, sensual, and evocative of the Academy Award–winning film \u003ci\u003eCinema Paradiso\u003c\/i\u003e and the international bestseller \u003ci\u003eThe Solitude of Prime Numbers\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eSwimming to Elba\u003c\/i\u003e is a harrowing yet redemptive meditation on politics, family, sex, and the lasting power of friendship.\u003c\/p\u003e “An engaging debut.” — \u003cb\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Readers will devour this richly detailed, sensual bildungsroman.”  — \u003cb\u003eBooklist\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A beach read for strong-willed, independent souls.”  — \u003cb\u003eKirkus\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Powerful. As trenchant as it is true.”   — \u003cb\u003eLe Parisien\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A galvanizing social novel, spacious and strenuous, like a film that would have been cosigned by Ken Loach and Gus Van Sant.”  — \u003cb\u003eLibération\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Characters unlike any you’ll find in Italian literature nowadays.”   — \u003cb\u003eGoffredo Fofi\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A book that skims close to the realm of the epic in its description of the desperate and empty lust for life of a tribe of young people and the small and vast tragedies that emerge from their struggles.”   — \u003cb\u003eGiorgio De Rienzo, Corriere delle Sera\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A novel capable of holding together—in the drift or in the tragedy of many lives—the thread of a hope that springs from two young lives that may be destined to fit together.”   — \u003cb\u003eGiovanni Tesio, Tuttolibri—La Stampa\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Silvia Avallone has a gift for painting a believable picture of not only her two leading characters, but of a crowd of actors: grief-stricken women, lazy factory workers, brutish thugs who frequent lap-dancing bars, young girls and boys who want to make the world their own. . . . Something verging on the operatic elegantly fills the pages of this remarkable novel.”   — \u003cb\u003eGiovanni Pacchiano, Il Sole 24 Ore\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “With Silvia Avallone, we are in the presence of a natural, original, and untutored talent, capable of capturing the contradictions of her own time in a rebellious, heartbreaking way. But the greatness of this book, at once carnal and chaste [...] lies in the powerful way that it identifies beauty and friendship as the two decisive, all-encompassing emotions of adolescence. It is a book that demands love, in its truthfulness, in its refusal to turn away from the life-giving breath of poetry.” — \u003cb\u003eGiuseppe Conte, Il Giornale\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Avallone skillfully tugs every thread in her tapestry with an artist’s hand. . . . This Avallone is a force of nature, with her exacting, precise prose, as in the spectacular opening passages.”  — \u003cb\u003eMassimo Onofri, Avvenire\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Following in the footsteps of the great tradition of a Tuscan and European author like Romano Bilenchi.”  — \u003cb\u003eDavide Barili, Gazzetta di Parma\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eSwimming to Elba\u003c\/i\u003e is intelligent and well written. It deserves its success: Silvia Avallone gives us a penetrating vision of the way the new proletariat lives. She narrates that story very well. I was reminded of Tuscan authors such as Carlo Cassola and Vasco Pratolini. She is a modern writer, but you can sense those roots.”  — \u003cb\u003eDacia Maraini, Oggi\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“From this first novel, she might one day write a novel that is to literature what Bernardo Bertolucci’s \u003ci\u003eNovecento\u003c\/i\u003e was for film.”   — \u003cb\u003eGianfranco Franchi, Secolo d’Italia\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A masterpiece of fine writing, literature in its purest state, as if the words had flowed like molten steel out of the blast furnace, to recount perfect characters and a magnificent story.”  — \u003cb\u003eCaterina Soffici, Il Riformista\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eSilvia Avallone\u003c\/b\u003e is a poet and novelist who was born in Biella, Italy, in 1984 and now lives in Bologna. \u003ci\u003eSwimming to Elba\u003c\/i\u003e, published in Italy as \u003ci\u003eAcciaio\u003c\/i\u003e, is her first novel.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAntony Shugaar\u003c\/b\u003e’s recent translations include \u003ci\u003eA Pimp’s Notes\u003c\/i\u003e by Giorgio Faletti, \u003ci\u003eBandit Love\u003c\/i\u003e by Massimo Carlotto, and \u003ci\u003eSandokan\u003c\/i\u003e by Nanni Balestini. He lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46301081141477,"sku":"NP9780143123651","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780143123651.jpg?v=1767737680","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/swimming-to-elba-isbn-9780143123651","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}