Sicilian Tragedee: A Novel [Ottavio Cappellani, Frederika Randall] on Amazon. com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Part Tarantino-style operetta, part.
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- Sicilian Tragedee : NPR
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A Little Too Far. La Vita Sexy Book 2. Sexy Surrender Book 3. The Italian Prince's Pregnant Bride. The City of Falling Angels.
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Rosolio Red a Franki Amato Mysteries holiday short story. Seven Seasons in Siena.
A Little Too Much. The Patience of the Spider. The Queen of the Big Time. The Guardian of Mercy. My Father Came From Italy. Defiant in the Desert. The Story of X.
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See Naples and Die. Bullets, Butterflies, and Italy. The Sun and Other Stars. Dark Soul, Volume I. As the Romans Do. The Demons of Aquilonia. Confessions, Adventures, and Advice.
Across the Bridge of Sighs. Lost and Found in Positano. One Hundred Naked Girls. When the Letter Comes. The Amalfi Alliance Book One. Metal and Dust Book 1: Who Is Lou Sciortino? Because really, this book was a waste of my time.
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And let me tell you why. First, let me talk about the characters. Well, there's plenty of them. There's Alfio Turrisi, who drives this right An edited version of this article was first published as Book Review: He happens to be in love with Betty Pirrotta, who unfortunately is the daughter of the rival mafia.
Sounds Romeo and Juliet , right? Well, it is, to some degree. There is a second couple, theatre director Tino Cagnotto, who perhaps is the most pathetic character in the book. He is in love with Bobo, a young muscular beefcake of an actor. Cagnotto is a neo-realist ; he is known for reinterpreting works of Shakespeare. And yes, the play that he directs in the book is none other than Romeo and Juliet.
And as part of the neo-realist re-interpretation, he decides that instead of Romeo falling for Juliet, Romeo should fall for Mercutio instead. Add to that a thousand other characters that span the whole Sicilian society: All of these with long Italian names that for the average English reader, is hard to distinguish one from another.
What results in that? I should say I wasn't a big fan of the writing style either. The novel is split into three sections. For the first two sections, the chapters are arranged such that multiple storylines are told by alternating chapters. Say, the first chapter would talk about Cagnotto the director and his boyfriend, followed by the second chapter which narrates Turrisi and his everyday events. The third chapter picks up Cagnotto again, but by the time I finished the second chapter, I was already lost in the structure that I forgot who Cagnotto was in the first place.
Multiple storylines on alternating chapters isn't really the problem per se , but it's because the content made it so opaque and therefore very hard for the reader to stitch things together and integrate it into a bigger picture.
Sicilian Tragedee : NPR
The things that were being talked about in the text border on farce, as the narration usually covers rather superficial and shallow things about the characters, in such a way that they remained flat. All the characters were never developed, all of their movements were quite predictable, and it was all the same page after page.
It was quite farcical and absurd.
To illustrate, every time Romeo clutches his quite huge codpiece while talking to Mercutio, someone dies in the theatre. Oh, I should say that the narrative was quite voluminous on the importance of a making the codpiece larger than average; and b clutching it at that point in the play. I have to admit that when I was reading this, I was so lost at this farcical and superficial narrative, that only after finishing the book and looking for a summary of it online did I finally understand who was who in the novel.
I am actually disappointed that this novel is another one of those books where gay characters are shallow and superficial. Why is that the case? This novel reminds me of Matthew Rettenmund's Boy Culture. In both books, the gay characters whine too much, overreact too much it's okay to overreact, just don't overdo it , and moan too much. Oh well, should I recommend this book? I am giving it 1 out of 5 stars. Tino Cagnotto is the stereotypical vain, extravagant, gay experimental theater director taking anti-depressants and stimulants, trying to find inspiration and funding for his next production as he is running out of money to support his lifestyle.
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Poor Cagnotto has run out of idea Tino Cagnotto is the stereotypical vain, extravagant, gay experimental theater director taking anti-depressants and stimulants, trying to find inspiration and funding for his next production as he is running out of money to support his lifestyle. Poor Cagnotto has run out of ideas, he has no current lover, and the doctor cannot get his medication straight.
Never mind that he frequently mixes the meds with a little alcohol! The local cultural commissioner needs a new production to attract tourists to the town, and is pushing him to come up with his next production. Turi Pirotta is a local mobster whose position is being usurped by Alfio Turrisi.
He is buying up land all around the island because it has oil on it. Pirotta started out driving a cement-mixer—that his how he wooed his wife, Wanda. Alfio catches a glimpse of Betty and falls in love—he writes to Pirotta to ask his permission to court the lovely Betty. Pirotta sees a way out of his business and family problems. Betty is out of the house and the enemy is part of the family. Cagnotto meets the charming young and innocent Bobo, who loves him.
The fun really begins when one of the commissioners is shot at the opening night production and it rolls on from there. An entertaining story from murderous start to happy ending! Aug 14, Tony rated it liked it Shelves: He is out to make his mark, but first he needs a proposal to submit to the regional director of the arts so he can get funding. He has no idea of what the proposal might be until he meets Bobo, an aspiring and gay actor. He decides to do a modern version of Romeo and Juliet, keeping in mind Cappellani, Ottavio.
He decides to do a modern version of Romeo and Juliet, keeping in mind that Catania is known for its modern approach to art and art interpretation. The critical piece of the ensuing drama is given right off at the start of the book, but at the time you have no idea what is going on. His production revolves a new interpretation of the lines between Romeo and Mercutio, who are really the star-crossed lovers of the drama. His interpretation involves the wearing of over-sized codpieces and gestures that clearly demonstrate the sexual frisson between the two.
He got the funding and made his mark for that current play season. In the audience, however, we also get to meet two rival mafiosi and a variety of other locals who, to say the least, are colorful with their language and deeds. In all, this is kind of a fun book, but it gets lost in its rapid shift of point of view as we work our way through it.
Sicilian Tragedee
We get to learn a lot about Catania in the process, though, especially when the author discusses food and previous artistic endeavors. On the whole, I thought the plot was more of a one-trick pony that the author strung out for pages. It might make a better movie.
I think that it would be easier to follow that way. Recommended to The Rainbow Zebra by: Won on First Reads. I found myself being confused by the numerous characters and the writing itself, whom some have said reminded them of the bare bones of a screenplay. I graduated with a degree in Literature, I enjoy books of all sorts.
But I was lost most of the time, and each time I was ready to give up, I resigned myself to keep going. In short--a lackluster group of actors keep attempting to put on a sometime improvised production of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. However, Death keeps stealing the stage. You'd think this would be a murder mystery but with so many characters to lose track of, and so many barely-there plot additions, what could have been a great book was turned into a "dear God let me finish this so I can review it and swap it out".
I suppose if you are Italian, are in Italy, or have great interest in the Italian Mafia, this book may be for you don't go for the Shakespeare, that's where I got sucked in. I had moments of amusement, and even the end made me stop and think no spoilers here! With all due respect to the Author and translator of course, the only Tragedee I found was having to spend the time reading this. It took me a while to get into this book, but part of the compulsion to keep reading it I am not opposed to stopping a book in the middle was to see how all the layers untangled themselves.
Some didn't, but by the end, I was prepared for that and came to my own conclusions. The ensemble cast in this book love to talk about themselves and gossip about each other, but the best characterization is from the author, who shows you who they really are by what they do.
Cappellani does capture modern S It took me a while to get into this book, but part of the compulsion to keep reading it I am not opposed to stopping a book in the middle was to see how all the layers untangled themselves. Cappellani does capture modern Sicilian life: I could tell there was word play galore, but in English it often came across stilted and awkward. Perhaps a less literal translation would have served the book, and the author's cleverness, better.
Sicilian Tragedee is very well written. The only problem I had with it is that it's pace is a little sluggish at times, and I had a difficult time keeping the names straight, but over all, I liked it.