My Brilliant Friend: Neapolitan Novels, Book One - Sidekick

by Bibliomaniac

Let the Sidekick to My Brilliant Friend: Neapolitan Novels, Book One help you get a firm understanding of the many characters and themes in this magnificent novel.
 
In this sidekick you’ll find:
 
Chapter Summaries
 
Characterization of main characters
 
Symbols
 
Themes
 
Discussion Questions
 
Disclaimer: This book serves as an accompaniment to the bestseller "My Brilliant Friend: Neapolitan Novels - Book One" by Elena Ferrante. It is meant to broaden the reader's understanding of the book and to offer some insights which can easily be overlooked. You should order a copy of the actual book before reading this.

Genres: Fiction, Book Club, Italy

33 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 15, 2016

Reviews

[Ebonee · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5: A lucid account of female friendship between two girls growing up in a lurid city. I've read very few authors who are able to write about the internal lives of women as Ferrante does, in such vivid, precise detail. After reading "The Lost Daughter", I will say "A Brilliant Friend" somewhat lacks the same intimate internal monologues that the former orchestrated so beautifully but the latter makes up for it in its brilliant reflection of how one's childhood can forever shape the direction of one's life.

[Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Feel very bad for people who "don't get" this book or are distressed that it's "too violent".

An excellent beginning to an engrossing, enriching series.

Thank you, Miss Ferrante.

[Ade · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book transformed me into the world of 1950s Naples and embodies the feeling ‘girl, so confusing’ leaves

[Geoff Warden · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first in the “Neapolitan Quartet” and a very enjoyable read. A translation from Italian and set in a very poor area of Naples shortly after World War 2, it tells the story of two girls, from primary school age to their late teens.

The narrator is Elena, a clever and determined girl who wants to escape the poverty of her back-ground. She excels at school and is encouraged to go on with her education, despite the initial lack of backing from her parents. The other main character is Lila, her closest friend and great rival at junior school. Both girls have an aptitude for learning and their rivalry spurs them on to academic success.

However. Lila has other plans. Her family is in the shoe repair business and she wants to design and make more sophisticated shoes than her father and brother are used to. Lila leaves school, but continues to self-educate. Later in the novel as the girls go through adolescence the lure of boyfriends becomes hard to resist. This forms the basis for the fragmentation of the girls’ friendship. An engaging read, but I’m nor sure if I want to continue the story with the later volumes.

[Deana · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are so many reviews here that I don't need to discuss plot of "My Brilliant Friend". It is so very true that there are just so many names! To help you remember all those names, I recommend that, if you get HBO, watch the presentation of "My Brilliant Friend" on HBO. It's a faithful TV version of the story. We had had the book on our shelf for many years, but were stymied by the number of characters. After watching the HBO series of "My Brilliant Friend", which is quite good, we both decided to give the book another try. That worked! Now I'm on the third book and loving everything I've read. The books are written so well that you just glide along. Even as I finish the third book in the series, I still get some of the secondary male characters names confusing, but, truly, it hasn't hindered my enjoyment of Elena Ferrante's brilliant friends. So if you don't get HBO, just do a month of it, and you can binge on "My Brilliant Friend". It would be worth it!

[Lauren Reimer · Rating 5 out of 5]

The beautiful prose in this book kept me wanting to absorb the story. The narrator's voice felt familiar and nostalgic, I loved reading her thoughts and feelings.

This story is a lovely ode to girlhood and the complexity (and necessity) of female friendships. It feels refreshingly realistic to the ups and downs of the adolescent experience.

I finished this book rooting for both of the main characters' success and happiness. 🥲

Looking forward to reading the rest of the books in the Neapolitan Quartet!

[Allison Floyd]

GUTGed on page 253 (48% mark, according to the eBook). I've been slogging through this for months (and months!), primarily motivated by the Maggie Nelson essay of the same name. Revisited that essay the other day, and I think I'm good with the paltry one-sentence aside about the book it actually contains. It's well-written and sharply observed, and Lila is indeed brilliant, but I just, for whatever reason, can't invest.

Onward!

[Kailin Huang · Rating 4 out of 5]

Related on the notion that just because you are friends with someone doesn’t mean you are never jealous of them ever.

The patriarchal, impoverished Naples is a scary yet gorgeous place to come to age in.

It got me thinking a lot about how the environment shapes a person and their life trajectory. Seeing how people reacted to factors beyond their control is fascinating and you can also draw parallel into your own lives.

[Maggie McEwen · Rating 4 out of 5]

BEAUTIFUL
I love all of my women in my life and this just reinforced the importance of those connections for me
Books like these that feel so deeply personal are so new for me and I just love them!
Definitely going to read the rest of this series throughout timeeeeeee

[Brenda · Rating 2 out of 5]

It didn’t capture my interest... too violent... murder ... rape... poverty ..

[Izabela · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing book!

[Becky Slattery · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gritty story with gritty and flawed characters. The writing was great, just a really heavy and at times violent story. Wasn’t sure who to root for.

[atu · Rating 5 out of 5]

tenés que cerrar el estadio, solo los genios hacen eso

[Nazll · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love complex female characters.

[Rea Roberts · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely loved this book. Ferrante perfectly encapsulates the experience of girlhood, with such vivid and immersive depictions of thoughts, feelings, and emotions that it felt like reading my own memories. The novel captures the highs and lows of growing up, girlhood and early adolescence alike, with striking honesty - particularly in its portrayal of love, loyalty, and the quiet undercurrent of envy that can occasionally exist within a close female friendship during such a tumultuous time. Really felt like I was transported back in time and had a perfect image of the main characters life and feelings. Hooked from beginning to end.

[Penny Nardelli · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great story of a particular era in Naples of the special friendship between two amazing girls Lila and Lenù. The book starts in the present when the girls are 65 years old and then after a few chapters they go to the past starting when the girls are 6 years old and the story finishes when they at 17. This is a bit frustrating for me because I did not plan to read the trilogy because I heard that the first book was the best but what do I do now? I will give it a break for a while read a few other books and then read the trilogy.

Elena Ferente has so many characters in My Brilliant Friend that I had to keep referring to the Index of Characters. Her way of telling a story was enchanting and unique. You can taste the tastes, smell the smells, feel the heat and hear the noises.

I loved this book.

[Alice · Rating 3 out of 5]

I heard so many rave views about this book that I couldn't wait to read it and give it a five star review. Perhaps it is my fault that I just can't do that. I am at a place where I don't have as much time for reading as I'd like so that I steal a half hour here and there whenever I can work it in. Reading "My Brilliant Friend" in drips and drabs doesn't work. There are just too many characters in it, especially the boys: Antonio, Pasquale, Enzo, Nino, Rino, Marcello, Alfonso, Stefano.....need I say more. And they were the son of the shoe maker, or was that the grocer? That being said, I also had trouble digesting the enormous amount of physical violence that takes place in that culture. I think the act of a father throwing his daughter out the window turned my opinion about the lot to the negative end of the opinion scale.

[Susan Coster · Rating 3 out of 5]

Besides getting a bit confused with the names (even though there is a chart in the front of the book), I wasn't thrilled with this book. Lila and Elena are two young girls growing up in the poor side on town in Naples, Italy. Lila is smart as a whip and learns Latin and other languages on her own while Elena struggles with her studies, at first, but, finally gains the attention of her teachers as being smart. Lila drops out of school to work at her father's shoe repair shop. Who is the brilliant friend? Is it Lila or Elena? Elena definitely leans on Lila's every word, worships her from near and afar! While Lila is inherently beautiful, Elena breaks out with acne and bloating....This is a story of friendship. Pick it up or NOT.

[Geri Degruy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is book one of a series. It's like the beginning of a Russian novel where the names of so many characters confuses the reader and you find yourself going back again and again to the identity list of characters at the very beginning of the book. It is also in Italy, a different culture and at an earlier time in history so it takes a bit of getting-used-to. It is nevertheless an good read and the introduction to a deep and odd friendship. I became ensorcelled. I've started book 2...

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

This four part Series is so intricate in its personal descriptions like no other fictional novel I've read. The plot is gripping even in the mundanity of everyday it's interesting. If life is "stranger than fiction" this has to be part auto biographical. I know the author uses a pseudo name and hasn't picked up any awards personally.

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just never really connected with any of the characters or storyline. I struggled to finish this book and after slogging through was disappointed in the ending. The best thing I can say is, I finished it.

[Jean Pyzik]

Not sure that I will finish this one. Not really liking the characters but I haven't totally rejected it yet.

[Bronwyn Foxall]

Difficult to get in to

[Olivia O'Leary · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved the descriptions of the neighbourhood in Naples. It also captures a female's adolescence beautifully.

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

literally the best book in the entire world

[Erin Zhang · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book I have read in the past ten years. I believe one day Elena Ferrante will win the Nobel prize for literature.

[Sara Gingold · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful tale of the complexity of friendship.

[Carol Morrison · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent coming of age story set in italy. candid. i listened to this as an audio book and really enjoyed the reader.