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Pietro Fenoglio #2
L'estate fredda
Siamo nel 1992, tra maggio e luglio. A Bari, come altrove, sono giorni di fuoco, fra agguati, uccisioni, casi di lupara bianca. Quando arriva la notizia che un bambino, figlio di un capo clan, è stato rapito, il maresciallo Pietro Fenoglio capisce che il punto di non ritorno è stato raggiunto. Adesso potrebbe accadere qualsiasi cosa. Poi, inaspettatamente, il giovane boss che ha scatenato la guerra, e che tutti sospettano del sequestro, decide di collaborare con la giustizia. Nella lunga confessione davanti al magistrato, l'uomo ripercorre la propria avventura criminale in un racconto ipnotico animato da una forza viva e diabolica; da quella potenza letteraria che Gadda attribuiva alla lingua dei verbali. Ma le dichiarazioni del pentito non basteranno a far luce sulla scomparsa del bambino. Per scoprire la verità Fenoglio sarà costretto a inoltrarsi in quel territorio ambiguo dove è più difficile distinguere ciò che è giusto da ciò che è sbagliato. Ambientato al tempo delle stragi di Palermo, L'estate fredda offre uno sguardo pauroso sulla natura umana, ma ci regala anche un protagonista di straordinaria, commovente dignità. E, alla fine, un inatteso bagliore di speranza.
326 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2016
81 people are currently reading
728 people want to read
About the author
Gianrico Carofiglio
59 books1,060 followersGianrico Carofiglio (born 1961) is a novelist and former anti-Mafia judge in the Italian city of Bari. His debut novel, Involuntary Witness, was published in 2002 and translated into English in 2005 by Patrick Creagh and published by the Bitter Lemon Press, and has been adapted as the basis for a popular television series in Italy. The subsequent novels were translated by Howard Curtis.
Carofiglio won the 2005 Premio Bancarella award for his novel "Il passato è una terra straniera". He is also Honorary President of The Edinburgh Gadda Prize which celebrates the work of Carlo Emilio Gadda.
The Past is a Foreign Country is the English language title of the 2004 novel Il passato è una terra straniera. It won the 2005 Premio Bancarella literary award. It has been translated into English.
Carofiglio won the 2005 Premio Bancarella award for his novel "Il passato è una terra straniera". He is also Honorary President of The Edinburgh Gadda Prize which celebrates the work of Carlo Emilio Gadda.
The Past is a Foreign Country is the English language title of the 2004 novel Il passato è una terra straniera. It won the 2005 Premio Bancarella literary award. It has been translated into English.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 168 reviews
December 24, 2016
Che si tratti di Guerrieri o di Fenoglio, la scrittura di Carofiglio è sempre accattivante.
Qui, poi, si parla delle pagine più tremende e devastanti della nostra storia: la mafia, i pentiti ed ancora gli attentati a Falcone e a Borsellino, che si muovono, è vero, sullo sfondo, ma che proiettano comunque la loro ombra terrificante ancora oggi.
Per il resto, un buon romanzo, un bel noir, che si snoda tra regole, legge, legalità e malavita, i cui confini a volte si appannano, fino a scomparire.
Ma la speranza, sempre dura a morire, alla fin fine, c'è e lascia un dolce sapore.
Ah, Fenoglio, Fenoglio... anche tra queste pagine mi sei piaciuto; tu e la tua umanità. Grande.
Qui, poi, si parla delle pagine più tremende e devastanti della nostra storia: la mafia, i pentiti ed ancora gli attentati a Falcone e a Borsellino, che si muovono, è vero, sullo sfondo, ma che proiettano comunque la loro ombra terrificante ancora oggi.
Per il resto, un buon romanzo, un bel noir, che si snoda tra regole, legge, legalità e malavita, i cui confini a volte si appannano, fino a scomparire.
Ma la speranza, sempre dura a morire, alla fin fine, c'è e lascia un dolce sapore.
Ah, Fenoglio, Fenoglio... anche tra queste pagine mi sei piaciuto; tu e la tua umanità. Grande.
August 6, 2018
Carofiglio was a part of Italy's justice system before writing fiction about Mafia wars, kidnappings, and such. Cold Summer is a story of a slow methodical investigation into the kidnapping of the son of a mafia boss and the battles to take down the criminal enterprises. At times brilliant, the narrative often failed to compel my attention, particularly with the lengthy interrogation of an informer. Nevertheless, the flashes of insight make this author one to keep an eye on.
November 8, 2022
Real Rating: 4.75* of five, rounded up
The Publisher Says: The summer of 1992 had been exceptionally cold in southern Italy. But that’s not the reason why it is still remembered.
On May 23, 1992, a roadside explosion killed the Palermo judge Giovanni Falcone, his wife and three police officers. A few weeks later judge Paolo Borsellino and five police officers were killed in the center of Palermo. These anti-mafia judges became heroes but the violence spread to the region of Bari in Puglia, where we meet a new, memorable character, Maresciallo Pietro Fenoglio, an officer of the Italian Carabinieri. Fenoglio, recently abandoned by his wife, must simultaneously deal with his personal crisis and the new gang wars raging around Bari.
The police are stymied until a gang member, accused of killing a child, decides to collaborate, revealing the inner workings and the rules governing organised crime in the area. The story is narrated through the actual testimony of the informant, a trope reminiscent of verbatim theatre which Carofiglio, an ex-anti-mafia judge himself, uses to great effect.
The gangs are stopped but the mystery of the boy’s murder must still be solved, leading Fenoglio into a world of deep moral ambiguity, where the prosecutors are hard to distinguish from the prosecuted.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: The cold summer indeed...very cold for those whose Earthly remains could, thanks to massive bombs killing them, be measured in teaspoons. Author Carofiglio was, during that memorable summer that turned the tide against the Sicilian Mafia and its other regional affiliates, a working prosecutor fairly early in his career. His story, as told here, is one that truly feels like it happened exactly this way despite its being fiction. When one knows the author's history, it does inform the experience of reading the author's words. In this case, I've been on Team Carofiglio since I first discovered the Guerrieri series a decade-plus ago.
In this book's case, it's the second Fenoglio novel written but the first translated into English. In Italian, the first one's called Una mutevole verità or literally "A Changing Truth" but I'd probably call it "Slippery Facts" or something similarly indicative of dishonesty. It's a much shorter work and isn't about Fenoglio so much as about how a man in his position...a "foreigner" to the Barese he works with since he's from Piedmont-Savoy (basically France to the Southern Italians)...can see but not get what he's seeing. This outing, being about a gigantic trauma that shook Italy to its core, makes more sense to have come out first in the series.
The set-up for the story is Author Carofiglio's usual quiet, meandering walk through the detective's days as the crime is committed and he begins to look into the causes and results of it. About midway through, a huge shift happens. In this story, the shift is a break in the wall of silence around organized crime's activities. All it takes is one lousy creep afraid of getting punished for a particularly unpopular crime (child harm is a death sentence in most prisons around the world) to blow open the stalled cases he knows about.
Structurally, the way Author Carofiglio manages the case-breaking event in this book is to spend several chapters on the scumbag's interrogation. This isn't flash-fast, as I imagine you're thinking it might be. Italian crime fighting moves at a different pace and to a different rhythm than the US version. The cast of characters is different because the legal system is organized very differently, with responsibilities split in different directions. That, for my dollar, is one of the selling points of these books. I am absolutely enrapt in the cast of legal characters and eager to hear more about what they do and why they do it...I suspect Translator Curtis, having worked on a half-dozen or more Carofiglio novels in several series (as well as no series at all), is responsible for the ways some characters discourse explanatorily...as it sharpens the pleasure of being swept up in a very different world. That being something I look for, and forward to, in my reads, I'm happy as Larry while it's going on. YMMV, of course, so don't forget to account for your own tolerance for exposition when choosing these reads.
The reason I'm fond of Fenoglio, and I suspect I'd be fond of Author Carofiglio, is the way his policemen philosophize:
The quiet musings of Pietro Fenoglio, an intelligent man, as he works his way through the complexities of human venality and evil, demanding a reckoning for those not able to demand one for themselves. I like this pace, this path, and this person's journey. I will say that I found the bad actors all a bit interchangeable. I can't for the life of me remember one's name without looking it up to be sure I'm not misassigning another one's name to him. Nothing made by human hands can ever be perfect, can it. But very damned good, this one's got locked down.
The Publisher Says: The summer of 1992 had been exceptionally cold in southern Italy. But that’s not the reason why it is still remembered.
On May 23, 1992, a roadside explosion killed the Palermo judge Giovanni Falcone, his wife and three police officers. A few weeks later judge Paolo Borsellino and five police officers were killed in the center of Palermo. These anti-mafia judges became heroes but the violence spread to the region of Bari in Puglia, where we meet a new, memorable character, Maresciallo Pietro Fenoglio, an officer of the Italian Carabinieri. Fenoglio, recently abandoned by his wife, must simultaneously deal with his personal crisis and the new gang wars raging around Bari.
The police are stymied until a gang member, accused of killing a child, decides to collaborate, revealing the inner workings and the rules governing organised crime in the area. The story is narrated through the actual testimony of the informant, a trope reminiscent of verbatim theatre which Carofiglio, an ex-anti-mafia judge himself, uses to great effect.
The gangs are stopped but the mystery of the boy’s murder must still be solved, leading Fenoglio into a world of deep moral ambiguity, where the prosecutors are hard to distinguish from the prosecuted.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: The cold summer indeed...very cold for those whose Earthly remains could, thanks to massive bombs killing them, be measured in teaspoons. Author Carofiglio was, during that memorable summer that turned the tide against the Sicilian Mafia and its other regional affiliates, a working prosecutor fairly early in his career. His story, as told here, is one that truly feels like it happened exactly this way despite its being fiction. When one knows the author's history, it does inform the experience of reading the author's words. In this case, I've been on Team Carofiglio since I first discovered the Guerrieri series a decade-plus ago.
In this book's case, it's the second Fenoglio novel written but the first translated into English. In Italian, the first one's called Una mutevole verità or literally "A Changing Truth" but I'd probably call it "Slippery Facts" or something similarly indicative of dishonesty. It's a much shorter work and isn't about Fenoglio so much as about how a man in his position...a "foreigner" to the Barese he works with since he's from Piedmont-Savoy (basically France to the Southern Italians)...can see but not get what he's seeing. This outing, being about a gigantic trauma that shook Italy to its core, makes more sense to have come out first in the series.
The set-up for the story is Author Carofiglio's usual quiet, meandering walk through the detective's days as the crime is committed and he begins to look into the causes and results of it. About midway through, a huge shift happens. In this story, the shift is a break in the wall of silence around organized crime's activities. All it takes is one lousy creep afraid of getting punished for a particularly unpopular crime (child harm is a death sentence in most prisons around the world) to blow open the stalled cases he knows about.
Structurally, the way Author Carofiglio manages the case-breaking event in this book is to spend several chapters on the scumbag's interrogation. This isn't flash-fast, as I imagine you're thinking it might be. Italian crime fighting moves at a different pace and to a different rhythm than the US version. The cast of characters is different because the legal system is organized very differently, with responsibilities split in different directions. That, for my dollar, is one of the selling points of these books. I am absolutely enrapt in the cast of legal characters and eager to hear more about what they do and why they do it...I suspect Translator Curtis, having worked on a half-dozen or more Carofiglio novels in several series (as well as no series at all), is responsible for the ways some characters discourse explanatorily...as it sharpens the pleasure of being swept up in a very different world. That being something I look for, and forward to, in my reads, I'm happy as Larry while it's going on. YMMV, of course, so don't forget to account for your own tolerance for exposition when choosing these reads.
The reason I'm fond of Fenoglio, and I suspect I'd be fond of Author Carofiglio, is the way his policemen philosophize:
“I like finding out what happened. In so far as it’s possible. I like that people trust me and decide to tell me what they know, even in the most unexpected situations. I like it when what I do – and it does happen – gives a little dignity back to those who’ve lost it. It gives meaning to chaos.”
–and–
The problem is that we like to control everything: a stupid, pointless, unhealthy idea. We need to have the opposite attitude, accept the fact that nobody really has any control over his or her own life: that was what the barman Nicola, from the Caffè Bohème, had said to him once.
One day at a time. He had also added that it’s a good rule not to take anything personally. We think that everything revolves around us: both what other people do and what they don’t do. It’s almost never true. Things happen and that’s it; most other people are uninterested in us, for good or ill.
The quiet musings of Pietro Fenoglio, an intelligent man, as he works his way through the complexities of human venality and evil, demanding a reckoning for those not able to demand one for themselves. I like this pace, this path, and this person's journey. I will say that I found the bad actors all a bit interchangeable. I can't for the life of me remember one's name without looking it up to be sure I'm not misassigning another one's name to him. Nothing made by human hands can ever be perfect, can it. But very damned good, this one's got locked down.
November 17, 2018
“This may be armchair philosophy, but I think certain jobs should be done by those who don’t feel right for it … Feeling a little out of place helps to make us more vigilant. Someone who feels absolutely right for it … doesn’t notice important details.”
The Cold Summer is the second book in the Pietro Fenoglio series by Italian author, Gianrico Carofiglio. The summer of 1992 in southern Italy has started out violently with the murder of an anti-mafia judge. Many are shocked by this awful crime, not least Pietro Fenoglio. Fenoglio is a Marshal with the Carabinieri, and the escalation of violence in Apulia has him concerned. Some believe it a result of friction within the local Societa Nostra, between the boss, Nicola Grimaldi and his lieutenants.
When Grimaldi’s young son is rumoured to have been kidnapped, everyone suspects Vito Lopez, who appears to be the one waging war on his boss. Fenoglio is not entirely convinced, though, and when Lopez approaches the Carabinieri to offer information about the Societa Nostra’s operations, Fenoglio realises he needs to further investigate the kidnapping. Once all conventional avenues prove fruitless, he takes a novel approach.
Carofiglio gives the reader a fast-paced tale that appears to be part fiction, part history. His own background as an anti-mafia prosecutor is much in evidence throughout the story, giving it an authenticity that is palpable. He uses a few clever devices to convey a large number of necessary facts: Fenoglio needs to brief a new Captain about past events as the lieutenant is absent; and the criminal who decides to offer information to the Carabinieri is intelligent, educated and articulate, making his lengthy testimony nonetheless interesting.
Pietro Fenoglio is an interesting character: he’s forty-one, with an education in literature but a passion for justice. He’s a little distracted by the absence of his wife and the possible disintegration of his marriage. There’s a lot about his job that he dislikes, but “I like finding out what happened. In so far as it’s possible. I like that people trust me and decide to tell me what they know, even in the most unexpected situations. I like it when what I do – and it does happen – gives a little dignity back to those who’ve lost it. It gives meaning to chaos.”
He has his rules: “Not lying to yourself (lying to others is inevitable), not making it personal, not getting too fond of your own conjectures, not abusing your own power. These are rules of behaviour, and in order to respect them you have to be aware of a fundamental truth: sooner or later, you will break all of them. You’re always walking a thin line, where balance is precarious. You always have to be on to avoid slipping and falling on the wrong side … the most important of all: you have to do your best.”
This excellent example of gritty Italian crime fiction is flawlessly translated from the Italian by Howard Curtis. It can easily be read as a stand-alone (the first volume has not been translated into English) and reads are likely to want to search out more translations of work by this talented author.
This unbiased review is from an unsolicited copy provided by Text Publishing.
The Cold Summer is the second book in the Pietro Fenoglio series by Italian author, Gianrico Carofiglio. The summer of 1992 in southern Italy has started out violently with the murder of an anti-mafia judge. Many are shocked by this awful crime, not least Pietro Fenoglio. Fenoglio is a Marshal with the Carabinieri, and the escalation of violence in Apulia has him concerned. Some believe it a result of friction within the local Societa Nostra, between the boss, Nicola Grimaldi and his lieutenants.
When Grimaldi’s young son is rumoured to have been kidnapped, everyone suspects Vito Lopez, who appears to be the one waging war on his boss. Fenoglio is not entirely convinced, though, and when Lopez approaches the Carabinieri to offer information about the Societa Nostra’s operations, Fenoglio realises he needs to further investigate the kidnapping. Once all conventional avenues prove fruitless, he takes a novel approach.
Carofiglio gives the reader a fast-paced tale that appears to be part fiction, part history. His own background as an anti-mafia prosecutor is much in evidence throughout the story, giving it an authenticity that is palpable. He uses a few clever devices to convey a large number of necessary facts: Fenoglio needs to brief a new Captain about past events as the lieutenant is absent; and the criminal who decides to offer information to the Carabinieri is intelligent, educated and articulate, making his lengthy testimony nonetheless interesting.
Pietro Fenoglio is an interesting character: he’s forty-one, with an education in literature but a passion for justice. He’s a little distracted by the absence of his wife and the possible disintegration of his marriage. There’s a lot about his job that he dislikes, but “I like finding out what happened. In so far as it’s possible. I like that people trust me and decide to tell me what they know, even in the most unexpected situations. I like it when what I do – and it does happen – gives a little dignity back to those who’ve lost it. It gives meaning to chaos.”
He has his rules: “Not lying to yourself (lying to others is inevitable), not making it personal, not getting too fond of your own conjectures, not abusing your own power. These are rules of behaviour, and in order to respect them you have to be aware of a fundamental truth: sooner or later, you will break all of them. You’re always walking a thin line, where balance is precarious. You always have to be on to avoid slipping and falling on the wrong side … the most important of all: you have to do your best.”
This excellent example of gritty Italian crime fiction is flawlessly translated from the Italian by Howard Curtis. It can easily be read as a stand-alone (the first volume has not been translated into English) and reads are likely to want to search out more translations of work by this talented author.
This unbiased review is from an unsolicited copy provided by Text Publishing.
April 25, 2023
Carofiglio is a former Mafia prosecutor and anti-Mafia adviser to the Italian government. In this novel, the author mixes fact with fiction in telling a story set around the time of the real-life murders of two prosecutors in Scicily, in 1992 - news of which I remember vividly as it set off a huge reaction which ultimately led to a major crackdown on the Sicilian Mafia. Here, Carofiglio sets his story in the Puglia region where Carabiniere Pietro Fenoglio is charged with investigating the kidnap of the young son of a powerful crime boss, Nicola Grimaldi. His initial presumption is that this is an act carried out by one of Grimaldi's rivals - but is it?
Fenoglio is an interesting character, he’d studied literature before embarking on a career in the police and is portrayed as a thoughtful philosopher as well as a dedicated fighter of crime. His wife has recently moved out of their home and it’s not know if this is a temporary of a permanent arrangement, so he also has this on his mind. But as the kidnapping case turns into a murder investigation, Vito Lopez, a rival of Grimaldi and perhaps the main suspect in the case, decides it’s time to do a deal with the police: he’ll tell all in exchange for protection.
There’s then a superbly constructed section which is essentially a long transcript of Lopez’s confession, something that’s interrupted from time to time to enable readers to catch up with events surrounding the case. The confession itself is, in part, a breakdown of how the crime group works: its recruitment, the designated levels within the organisation, the rituals surrounding promotions, and so on. It’s fascinating stuff, and given the author’s background it feels like an authentic insight to this dark, hidden world.
Carofiglio is a superb writer who comes with a background which adds a significant degree of weight to his stories. He’s the genuine article, a man who has done what he writes about. In this story he lifts the lid on many of the violent and arcane procedures which are part and parcel of the Italian underworld, in telling a story that is as dramatic as it is sad.
Fenoglio is an interesting character, he’d studied literature before embarking on a career in the police and is portrayed as a thoughtful philosopher as well as a dedicated fighter of crime. His wife has recently moved out of their home and it’s not know if this is a temporary of a permanent arrangement, so he also has this on his mind. But as the kidnapping case turns into a murder investigation, Vito Lopez, a rival of Grimaldi and perhaps the main suspect in the case, decides it’s time to do a deal with the police: he’ll tell all in exchange for protection.
There’s then a superbly constructed section which is essentially a long transcript of Lopez’s confession, something that’s interrupted from time to time to enable readers to catch up with events surrounding the case. The confession itself is, in part, a breakdown of how the crime group works: its recruitment, the designated levels within the organisation, the rituals surrounding promotions, and so on. It’s fascinating stuff, and given the author’s background it feels like an authentic insight to this dark, hidden world.
Carofiglio is a superb writer who comes with a background which adds a significant degree of weight to his stories. He’s the genuine article, a man who has done what he writes about. In this story he lifts the lid on many of the violent and arcane procedures which are part and parcel of the Italian underworld, in telling a story that is as dramatic as it is sad.
January 5, 2017
4.5
Torno con gioia - e sorpresa, viste le cocenti delusioni degli ultimi anni - fra le braccia letterarie di Carofiglio, con questo romanzo sulle zone grigie, e sui confini (a volte sfumati, a volte no) fra il bene e il male.
Volutamente con le minuscole, perché sono bene e male di ogni giorno, bene e male di gente comune.
Torno con gioia - e sorpresa, viste le cocenti delusioni degli ultimi anni - fra le braccia letterarie di Carofiglio, con questo romanzo sulle zone grigie, e sui confini (a volte sfumati, a volte no) fra il bene e il male.
Volutamente con le minuscole, perché sono bene e male di ogni giorno, bene e male di gente comune.
March 21, 2018
1992, anno cruciale: è la strage di Capaci, la mafia imperversa in Sicilia.
Ma anche Bari ci mette del suo: ci sono le gang cittadine che si fronteggiano e stabiliscono di volta in volta instabili primati.
In questo caso si tratta di un capo clan locale a cui hanno rapito il figlio. Il pentito di turno è disposto a raccontare ai carabinieri diverse scottanti verità. Lopez, ex pupillo del boss, è un giovane uomo educato, si esprime con proprietà di linguaggio e pacatezza...un primo luogo comune, quello che marca la differenza tra buoni e cattivi, è destinato a saltare: "C’erano criminali stupidi, brutali, cattivi e odiosi. Erano come dovrebbero essere i criminali per corrispondere a una visione semplice e tranquillizzante del mondo. Siete diversi da noi. Voi i cattivi, noi i buoni. Tutto chiaro e decifrabile"
Fenoglio, l'(improbabile) ispettore piemontese che ha in mano l'indagine riflette: purtroppo le cose spesso non stanno così. Il confine tra difensori del bene e seminatori del male è labile e incerto, o piuttosto è mobile, facilmente disgregabile, sostituibile.
E'attraverso questo espediente che Carofiglio, intanto, ci racconta in dettaglio quali sono i riti di affiliazione della cosca mafiosa, anche utilizzando il linguaggio nitido e formale dei verbali degli interrogatori, che occupano buona parte della narrazione nella prima parte del romanzo.
(E non poteva mancare una riflessione attenta sull'antilingua, così ben descritta da Calvino, una lingua volta a dematerializzare il mondo, a "trasformare, sotto dettatura, fatti terribili e sanguinosi in lingua burocratica e asettica, sterilizzandoli, privandoli della incomprensibile violenza della vita, addomesticandoli, rendendoli materiale da fascicolo e da archivio").
Di tutti i delitti commessi Lopez è disposto ad accusarsi, di tutti tranne uno: il rapimento e l'uccisione del figlio del boss.
Su questo bisognerà aprire un'altra pista di indagine e sarà una strada piena di stupefacenti, amare sorprese.
Ma anche Bari ci mette del suo: ci sono le gang cittadine che si fronteggiano e stabiliscono di volta in volta instabili primati.
In questo caso si tratta di un capo clan locale a cui hanno rapito il figlio. Il pentito di turno è disposto a raccontare ai carabinieri diverse scottanti verità. Lopez, ex pupillo del boss, è un giovane uomo educato, si esprime con proprietà di linguaggio e pacatezza...un primo luogo comune, quello che marca la differenza tra buoni e cattivi, è destinato a saltare: "C’erano criminali stupidi, brutali, cattivi e odiosi. Erano come dovrebbero essere i criminali per corrispondere a una visione semplice e tranquillizzante del mondo. Siete diversi da noi. Voi i cattivi, noi i buoni. Tutto chiaro e decifrabile"
Fenoglio, l'(improbabile) ispettore piemontese che ha in mano l'indagine riflette: purtroppo le cose spesso non stanno così. Il confine tra difensori del bene e seminatori del male è labile e incerto, o piuttosto è mobile, facilmente disgregabile, sostituibile.
E'attraverso questo espediente che Carofiglio, intanto, ci racconta in dettaglio quali sono i riti di affiliazione della cosca mafiosa, anche utilizzando il linguaggio nitido e formale dei verbali degli interrogatori, che occupano buona parte della narrazione nella prima parte del romanzo.
(E non poteva mancare una riflessione attenta sull'antilingua, così ben descritta da Calvino, una lingua volta a dematerializzare il mondo, a "trasformare, sotto dettatura, fatti terribili e sanguinosi in lingua burocratica e asettica, sterilizzandoli, privandoli della incomprensibile violenza della vita, addomesticandoli, rendendoli materiale da fascicolo e da archivio").
Di tutti i delitti commessi Lopez è disposto ad accusarsi, di tutti tranne uno: il rapimento e l'uccisione del figlio del boss.
Su questo bisognerà aprire un'altra pista di indagine e sarà una strada piena di stupefacenti, amare sorprese.
January 19, 2020
Enziteto was part of the city abandoned by everyone, although it was less than two miles from the sea, the restaurants, the bathing beaches, the airport. You take the little turn-off that leads to the neighbourhood from the highway, and from one moment to the next you find yourself somewhere unknowable. Somewhere abstract…
Spring 1992, Bari, (at the heel of southern Italy, where the Adriatic joins the Mediterranean Sea). It is a time when organised crime seems to have the upper hand. Judges are assassinated, murders are routine, stolen goods and drugs trafficked. In the midst of this off-duty Carabinieri Marshal, Pietro Fenoglio, foils a hold-up attempt by a petty criminal claiming he has AIDS, and is threatening a cashier with a syringe. Fenoglio recognizes the man who hangs around the burned-out Teatro Petruzzelli as an unlicensed car park attendant. He calls it in, for the man to appear before the court and advises him to put in a plea bid.
Then he receives intelligence that as part of the ongoing gang war, the son of local Mafioso boss, Nicola Grimaldi, has been kidnapped, a ransom demanded and paid. But getting people to cooperate is difficult, and when the kidnapping turns tragic and an anonymous tip-off reveals the location of the boy’s body, Vito Lopez, once a Grimaldi lieutenant, hands himself in, agreeing to disclose details of the gang known as Società Nostra and its activities, in return for immunity from prosecution.
In the second part of the book Lopez reveals how he was recruited personally by Grimaldi while in jail, awaiting a court appearance. He details the structure and rituals of the gang, loosely based on that of the N’drangheta, how members “advance” through the organization by “gifts” rather than ranks, performed by rituals in buildings baptized for that purpose, with the candidate swearing loyalty (omertà) only to the gang, foreswearing their own blood relatives, “in the name of our ancestors, the three Spanish knights Osso, Mastrosso and Carcagnossa…” – almost as a religious order might operate. Lopez’s testimony shines a light on unsolved murders, including crimes the Carabinieri are not even aware of, posing a moral dilemma for the detectives and magistrate.
The legal rules were clear, as was the solution: there was no room for reflection or speculation. But were the ethical rules governing a case like this equally clear? From the point of view of individual morality, was it right to get someone who has helped you out of friendship – or fear – into trouble?
Clinical though his account is, Lopez maintains his innocence in the kidnapping (and death) of Grimaldi’s son, or the missing ransom. In the final apart of the book and aided by Corporal Tonino Pellachia, Marshal Pietro Fenoglio investigates other “lightning kidnappings” – a person abducted, the ransom paid and the hostage released, the authorities never notified, hoping for a breakthrough. Which comes through an unlikely source, the unlicensed car park attendant…
Author Gianrico Carofiglio, once a member of the Italian senate and an anti-mafia prosecutor in Bari, brings us a story inspired by true events, translated into English by Howard Curtis, and grips the reader throughout.
Spring 1992, Bari, (at the heel of southern Italy, where the Adriatic joins the Mediterranean Sea). It is a time when organised crime seems to have the upper hand. Judges are assassinated, murders are routine, stolen goods and drugs trafficked. In the midst of this off-duty Carabinieri Marshal, Pietro Fenoglio, foils a hold-up attempt by a petty criminal claiming he has AIDS, and is threatening a cashier with a syringe. Fenoglio recognizes the man who hangs around the burned-out Teatro Petruzzelli as an unlicensed car park attendant. He calls it in, for the man to appear before the court and advises him to put in a plea bid.
Then he receives intelligence that as part of the ongoing gang war, the son of local Mafioso boss, Nicola Grimaldi, has been kidnapped, a ransom demanded and paid. But getting people to cooperate is difficult, and when the kidnapping turns tragic and an anonymous tip-off reveals the location of the boy’s body, Vito Lopez, once a Grimaldi lieutenant, hands himself in, agreeing to disclose details of the gang known as Società Nostra and its activities, in return for immunity from prosecution.
In the second part of the book Lopez reveals how he was recruited personally by Grimaldi while in jail, awaiting a court appearance. He details the structure and rituals of the gang, loosely based on that of the N’drangheta, how members “advance” through the organization by “gifts” rather than ranks, performed by rituals in buildings baptized for that purpose, with the candidate swearing loyalty (omertà) only to the gang, foreswearing their own blood relatives, “in the name of our ancestors, the three Spanish knights Osso, Mastrosso and Carcagnossa…” – almost as a religious order might operate. Lopez’s testimony shines a light on unsolved murders, including crimes the Carabinieri are not even aware of, posing a moral dilemma for the detectives and magistrate.
The legal rules were clear, as was the solution: there was no room for reflection or speculation. But were the ethical rules governing a case like this equally clear? From the point of view of individual morality, was it right to get someone who has helped you out of friendship – or fear – into trouble?
Clinical though his account is, Lopez maintains his innocence in the kidnapping (and death) of Grimaldi’s son, or the missing ransom. In the final apart of the book and aided by Corporal Tonino Pellachia, Marshal Pietro Fenoglio investigates other “lightning kidnappings” – a person abducted, the ransom paid and the hostage released, the authorities never notified, hoping for a breakthrough. Which comes through an unlikely source, the unlicensed car park attendant…
Author Gianrico Carofiglio, once a member of the Italian senate and an anti-mafia prosecutor in Bari, brings us a story inspired by true events, translated into English by Howard Curtis, and grips the reader throughout.
April 29, 2017
Con L'estate fredda non siamo più di fronte a una aula di tribunale, come nei precedenti romanzi di Carofiglio. Non c'è più l'avvocato Guerrieri, ma un nuovo personaggio. Lo scenario cambia. La location è una caserma dei carabinieri e il protagonista è il maresciallo Fenoglio.
Il titolo rappresenta, racconta molto bene il significato e quello che Carofiglio vuole dire. L'estate fredda del titolo è il periodo compreso tra maggio e luglio del 1992, un periodo terribile e nefasto per l'Italia. Qui ci troviamo a Palermo e il maresciallo Fenoglio è alle prese con un bambino scomparso. Con questo romanzo ci addentriamo negli interrogatori lunghi ed estenuanti, impariamo cosa vuol dire essere parte di una organizzazione mafiosa, di una "famiglia" mafiosa. Sono gli anni di Borsellino e di Falcone, gli anni delle stragi di Via D'Amelio. Carofiglio ci fa entrare in questo mondo restituendoci un po' di speranza, anche grazie a un protagonista determinato e caparbio.
Il titolo rappresenta, racconta molto bene il significato e quello che Carofiglio vuole dire. L'estate fredda del titolo è il periodo compreso tra maggio e luglio del 1992, un periodo terribile e nefasto per l'Italia. Qui ci troviamo a Palermo e il maresciallo Fenoglio è alle prese con un bambino scomparso. Con questo romanzo ci addentriamo negli interrogatori lunghi ed estenuanti, impariamo cosa vuol dire essere parte di una organizzazione mafiosa, di una "famiglia" mafiosa. Sono gli anni di Borsellino e di Falcone, gli anni delle stragi di Via D'Amelio. Carofiglio ci fa entrare in questo mondo restituendoci un po' di speranza, anche grazie a un protagonista determinato e caparbio.
November 12, 2016
E’ un periodo che leggo molto in elettronico (si, lo so, i puristi storceranno il naso). Credo dipenda principalmente da un paio di fattori: il primo ha a che vedere con la fotosensibilità degli occhi-amati-tanto di mia moglie, l’altro con la scoperta che posso trascinarmi in giro i tre libri che sto leggendo (nella triplice e magica tripletta saggio-giallo-romanzone) senza ricolmare la borsa del pc e senza che la mia spalla destra subisca gli effetti di una inevitabile artrite galoppante.
Il problema è che sullo stesso device con cui leggo è installato da qualche settimana NBA 2K17, l’app di pallacanestro più amata che ci sia. Una roba talmente realistica che ho passato in panchina i nove/decimi delle mie prime quattro partite NBA, nonostante un dignitoso percorso al college di Wake Forrest. Ora va meglio, sono in quintetto base e ieri ho persino inchiodato una bimane in contropiede saltando sul divano come un indemoniato.
Sto divagando, ma solo per spiegare che per resistere alla tentazione di scendere nuovamente sul parquet ogni volta che prendevo l’Ipad in mano ci voleva un bel romanzo: ecco, L’estate fredda – ultima fatica letteraria di Gianrico Carofiglio – è un bel romanzo.
Se state sognando una nuova avventura dell’avvocato Guido Guerrieri, devo ahimè deludervi. Ma voglio immediatamente aggiungere che Fenoglio, maresciallo dei Carabinieri dal pensiero acuto e cognome letterario già protagonista di Una mutevole verità, è un gran bel personaggio. Così come è assolutamente convincente l’ambientazione primi anni Novanta: il romanzo è un delicato e sentito omaggio alle figure di Falcone e Borsellino, i cui omicidi costituiscono uno sfondo narrativo intenso a tratti quasi struggente. Al racconto di un pentito e della scomparsa del figlio di un boss pugliese si accavallano dubbi etici, sconforto professionale, senso del dovere, tracciando il ritratto di una geografia difficile e di uomini e donne dedite a un compito superomistico senza neppure il sostegno della popolazione.
Se avete amato il Carofiglio saggista di interrogatori e procedure giudiziarie, amerete oltremodo L’estate fredda. Se preferite il suo catalogo narrativo, invece pure.
http://capitolo23.com/2016/11/12/lest...
Il problema è che sullo stesso device con cui leggo è installato da qualche settimana NBA 2K17, l’app di pallacanestro più amata che ci sia. Una roba talmente realistica che ho passato in panchina i nove/decimi delle mie prime quattro partite NBA, nonostante un dignitoso percorso al college di Wake Forrest. Ora va meglio, sono in quintetto base e ieri ho persino inchiodato una bimane in contropiede saltando sul divano come un indemoniato.
Sto divagando, ma solo per spiegare che per resistere alla tentazione di scendere nuovamente sul parquet ogni volta che prendevo l’Ipad in mano ci voleva un bel romanzo: ecco, L’estate fredda – ultima fatica letteraria di Gianrico Carofiglio – è un bel romanzo.
Se state sognando una nuova avventura dell’avvocato Guido Guerrieri, devo ahimè deludervi. Ma voglio immediatamente aggiungere che Fenoglio, maresciallo dei Carabinieri dal pensiero acuto e cognome letterario già protagonista di Una mutevole verità, è un gran bel personaggio. Così come è assolutamente convincente l’ambientazione primi anni Novanta: il romanzo è un delicato e sentito omaggio alle figure di Falcone e Borsellino, i cui omicidi costituiscono uno sfondo narrativo intenso a tratti quasi struggente. Al racconto di un pentito e della scomparsa del figlio di un boss pugliese si accavallano dubbi etici, sconforto professionale, senso del dovere, tracciando il ritratto di una geografia difficile e di uomini e donne dedite a un compito superomistico senza neppure il sostegno della popolazione.
Se avete amato il Carofiglio saggista di interrogatori e procedure giudiziarie, amerete oltremodo L’estate fredda. Se preferite il suo catalogo narrativo, invece pure.
http://capitolo23.com/2016/11/12/lest...
June 30, 2019
Il protagonista di questa serie di romanzi gialli di Gianrico Carofiglio è il maresciallo dei carabinieri Pietro Fenoglio, torinese trapiantato al sud, un uomo onesto, intelligente e persino raffinato, che ama la buona musica, le buone letture e che, quando può, frequenta anche la Pinacoteca di Bari.
Ed è a Bari, nell’estate del 1992, che si svolge il racconto, tra gli interrogatori incalzanti di un nuovo pentito, il rapimento di un bambino figlio del boss locale e le grandi stragi di quel terribile anno, parlo degli omicidi di Falcone, Borsellino e dei loro sfortunati accompagnatori.
Carofiglio scrive bene e rende reali le storie e le situazioni che ben conosce da uomo della Giustizia reale.
I personaggi, sia che si tratti del malavitoso di quartiere che del boss temuto da tutti, del guardaspalle o dell’ufficiale dei carabinieri, prendono vita, agiscono, con le loro debolezze e passioni, portando a termine questo dramma in tre atti in cui gli avvenimenti storici veri fanno armonicamente da contrappunto a quelli inventati.
Ho apprezzato la bravura nel miscelare con sapienza il linguaggio formale degli interrogatori con quello di strada, la prosa popolare con quella più raffinata ed il flusso di pensieri del protagonista con i suoi drammi interiori.
Un romanzo imperfetto, ma molto piacevole da leggere.
Ed è a Bari, nell’estate del 1992, che si svolge il racconto, tra gli interrogatori incalzanti di un nuovo pentito, il rapimento di un bambino figlio del boss locale e le grandi stragi di quel terribile anno, parlo degli omicidi di Falcone, Borsellino e dei loro sfortunati accompagnatori.
Carofiglio scrive bene e rende reali le storie e le situazioni che ben conosce da uomo della Giustizia reale.
I personaggi, sia che si tratti del malavitoso di quartiere che del boss temuto da tutti, del guardaspalle o dell’ufficiale dei carabinieri, prendono vita, agiscono, con le loro debolezze e passioni, portando a termine questo dramma in tre atti in cui gli avvenimenti storici veri fanno armonicamente da contrappunto a quelli inventati.
Ho apprezzato la bravura nel miscelare con sapienza il linguaggio formale degli interrogatori con quello di strada, la prosa popolare con quella più raffinata ed il flusso di pensieri del protagonista con i suoi drammi interiori.
Un romanzo imperfetto, ma molto piacevole da leggere.
May 31, 2017
Anche Pietro Fenoglio, maresciallo dei carabinieri sabaudo, trapiantato nel Sud Italia, è un personaggio che si fa amare dai lettori come l'avvocato Guerrieri. In questo romanzo, che racconta anni di storia, Gianrico Carofiglio ci porta indietro nel tempo, nell'anno 1992, e in Italia, a partire dall'inchiesta di Mani Pulite, sta per accadere di tutto, tutto terribile e luttuoso, tutto destinato a lasciare il segno. In questo romanzo, Carofiglio ci racconta la mafia, attraverso una serie di interminabili interrogatori. Ci racconta gli attentati a Falcone e a Borsellino. Ci presenta un personaggio che piace al lettore perché è umano, buono, onesto, coraggioso, instancabile.
Con L'ESTATE FREDDA, ho provato qualcosa di diverso. Ho scelto l'edizione in audiolibro, perché è un ottimo modo per rilassarsi ed intrattenersi intellettualmente a fine giornata. A leggere, anche per me, il romanzo L'ESTATE FREDDA è lo stesso autore, lo scrittore Gianrico Carofiglio.
È stata un'emozione unica. Ha contribuito a dare spessore ai personaggi.
La voce di Carofiglio ha dato vita alle sue creature intellettuali, ai suoi personaggi letterari, ed ha raggiunto un ottimo risultato.
July 19, 2017
Coincidenze
Era il 19 di luglio, domenica... (pag. 337)
Domenica 19 luglio 1992: questo romanzo termina, non a caso, nella data dell'attentato di via D'Amelio a Palermo, in cui rimasero uccisi Paolo Borsellino e i componenti della sua scorta.
Oggi è il 19 luglio e terminare il libro proprio in questo giorno ne accresce l'urto emozionale, ne amplifica i contenuti umani ed etici.
Quel che si dice il libro giusto al momento giusto: pathos a mille.
Era il 19 di luglio, domenica... (pag. 337)
Domenica 19 luglio 1992: questo romanzo termina, non a caso, nella data dell'attentato di via D'Amelio a Palermo, in cui rimasero uccisi Paolo Borsellino e i componenti della sua scorta.
Oggi è il 19 luglio e terminare il libro proprio in questo giorno ne accresce l'urto emozionale, ne amplifica i contenuti umani ed etici.
Quel che si dice il libro giusto al momento giusto: pathos a mille.
April 28, 2018
Gradevole, piacevole il solito protagonista onesto pensoso e sensibile, bella la magistrata donna, ma troppi verbali, troppe sigarette.
September 26, 2017
Il sequestro lampo del figlio di un boss mafioso, una faida fra clan e il boss rivale che decide improvvisamente di collaborare con la giustizia, confessando i suoi crimini ed aiutando così carabinieri e polizia a mettere le mani su una rete di malviventi che operano sul territorio : questi sono gli ingredienti principali della storia, ambientata ai tempi delle stragi di Falcone e Borsellino e denominata dagli inquirenti "Estate fredda". Alternando una scrittura scorrevole a resoconti di verbali di interrogatori che comunque non risultano mai aridi o noiosi, anzi si leggono con facilità, l'autore racconta l'indagine, mescolando molto bene realtà e finzione e facendo riflettere il lettore, a più riprese, su quanto sia labile il confine fra "buoni" e "cattivi", perchè non sempre la realtà è bianca o nera, anzi ci sono molto spesso zone grigie da attraversare, o con cui convivere. La lettura è scorrevole ed appassionante, senza grandi colpi di scena, ma un finale molto imprevedibile che lascia un po' di amaro in bocca e tanti interrogativi a cui difficilmente riusciremo a dare una risposta.
December 31, 2016
Anche se preferisco il personaggio dell'avvocato Guido Guerrieri devo ammettere che il maresciallo Pietro Fenoglio è comunque un bel personaggio. Questo romanzo sembra quasi diviso in due parti, la prima dedicata alla guerra di mafia e alla confessione del collaboratore di giustizia, la seconda, molto più avvincente, alle indagini sui reali responsabili del rapimento del bambino. Sullo sfondo la tragica storia italiana di quei mesi del 1992 dell'assassinio dei giudici Falcone e Borsellino.
September 6, 2018
Interesting insights into a Mafia-type group in Bari, in the south of Italy. The book is fiction, though there are a couple of real-life incidents included, but a good deal of the middle section centres around a long confession by one of the Mafia, and shows their casual attitude to life, the law and villainy.
Beyond that, the story is very low-key. Most violence takes place offstage, as it were, described after the event in the course of one of the innumerable conversations.
The characters are well-drawn, but they don't do much. With many of them there's not much activity, not a great deal of suspense or tension and quite a bit of philosophical stuff about what good and evil is.
A curious book, and it's hard to tell from it what sort of a writer Carofiglio is. If this is typical of his work, he's fairly laid back!
Beyond that, the story is very low-key. Most violence takes place offstage, as it were, described after the event in the course of one of the innumerable conversations.
The characters are well-drawn, but they don't do much. With many of them there's not much activity, not a great deal of suspense or tension and quite a bit of philosophical stuff about what good and evil is.
A curious book, and it's hard to tell from it what sort of a writer Carofiglio is. If this is typical of his work, he's fairly laid back!
Read
September 7, 2018‘Carofiglio's engaging main character...Fenoglio is a sensitive, polished figure who has managed to keep his idealism intact in a career meant to break it; he is as comfortable philosophising as he is citing the public safety code.’
Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews
October 9, 2018
There’s been some debate recently on ‘literary crime’ novels and whether they must be one or the other, but this is a good example of such a book. It’s certainly more than a crime novel, in its reflection on Italy’s recent past and its descriptions of characters on either side; perpetrators, victims and the police. The author was also a prosecutor at the time of the events (summer of 1992), and as one might expect, writes with authority and experience.
The story takes place after an unusually high level of violence involving the Mafia in Apulia sparks a war. There is a particularly effective few chapters of interrogation in the middle of the novel that work really well, and heighten the tension as the climax approaches.
It’s perfect as a crime novel that’s a bit different, and also for historical interest as something that doesn’t glamourise organised crime but is prepared to highlight the lives of the people who fight against it.
It’s the first of a series which is good news also.
The story takes place after an unusually high level of violence involving the Mafia in Apulia sparks a war. There is a particularly effective few chapters of interrogation in the middle of the novel that work really well, and heighten the tension as the climax approaches.
It’s perfect as a crime novel that’s a bit different, and also for historical interest as something that doesn’t glamourise organised crime but is prepared to highlight the lives of the people who fight against it.
It’s the first of a series which is good news also.
Read
March 10, 2024Ambientato tra maggio e luglio del 1992 un periodo che tutti noi conosciamo, l’anno delle stragi delle lupare bianche, e a Bari un bambino viene rapito, il figlio di un boss, è l’inizio di un indagine difficile, sia perché si tratta di una giovane vittima, ma anche perchè si parla di un associazione di stampo mafiosa in Puglia.
Fenoglio si deve inoltrare nel fango, nel buio per poter risolvere il caso.
Anche questa seconda avventura l’ho letta di getto, in poco più di 24 ore, ogni momento libero era buono per leggere, per comprendere per capire chi era stato capace a rapire e poi uccidere il figlio di un boss, e poi oltre l’adrenalina delle indagine, ci sono stati gli occhi lucidi, quando c’è stato il ricordo di Falcone e Borsellino.
Terminato il libro ho fatto la maratona telefilm, per vedere se rimanevo delusa dal maresciallo Fenoglio televisivo, come mi accade spesso, ma questa volta sono stata piacevolmente sorpresa, forse perché l’autore ha curato la sceneggiatura, e tra i libri e la serie a parte alcuni particolari diversi è molto simile.
Mi piacciono i capitoli brevi, la descrizione di Bari, i sentimenti di Fenoglio, la sua dolcezza e la sua malinconia e la sua integrità.
Mi mancherà questo personaggio.
Fenoglio si deve inoltrare nel fango, nel buio per poter risolvere il caso.
Anche questa seconda avventura l’ho letta di getto, in poco più di 24 ore, ogni momento libero era buono per leggere, per comprendere per capire chi era stato capace a rapire e poi uccidere il figlio di un boss, e poi oltre l’adrenalina delle indagine, ci sono stati gli occhi lucidi, quando c’è stato il ricordo di Falcone e Borsellino.
Terminato il libro ho fatto la maratona telefilm, per vedere se rimanevo delusa dal maresciallo Fenoglio televisivo, come mi accade spesso, ma questa volta sono stata piacevolmente sorpresa, forse perché l’autore ha curato la sceneggiatura, e tra i libri e la serie a parte alcuni particolari diversi è molto simile.
Mi piacciono i capitoli brevi, la descrizione di Bari, i sentimenti di Fenoglio, la sua dolcezza e la sua malinconia e la sua integrità.
Mi mancherà questo personaggio.
September 12, 2024
You can find my review on my blog by clicking here.
Author Gianrico Carofiglio tells the story of Pietro Fenoglio, an officer of the Italian Carabinieri, who finds himself invested in a mafia family’s missing child situation. While simultaneously dealing with his own personal issues, he must also decipher the ongoing Apulian Mafia war around Bari in Italy. As numerous characters crosses paths with Pietro Fenoglio and the police, they slowly untangle the complex inner workings of the ruling organized crime and depict the complicated relationship between morality, legality, and criminality.
An ex-anti-mafia judge himself, author Gianrico Caroflio shows his readers his knowledge of organized crime and police through this story. While you progressively work your way through the mystery at hand, encountering new characters and obtaining new information that reels you closer to the truth about the missing child, the author includes various details about the modus operandi of both cops and criminals in this police procedural. In fact, this story even highlights the sketchier behaviours of individuals that would normally be considered the good guys, contextualizing it all within the tense Italian mafia war at play.
While each new character brings something crucial to the table, it is difficult to empathize with any of them, including the protagonist. In fact, a good chunk of the book is also written in the style of a verbatim, reporting an interrogation between a gang member who decides to collaborate with the police and spill the bean on a multitude of crimes and events. That section of the book sort of kills the narrative’s flow, making this crime fiction feel more like true crime, without the edge of a real true-crime story.
Nonetheless, this stand-alone story reads quite easily, full of very short chapters, and allows you to discover the historical events that inspired this story, the real Italian summer of 1992.
The Cold Summer is an interesting crime fiction that blends reality with fiction as it embraces the Apulian Mafia war in the early 1990s.
October 17, 2021
Al contrario del primo - che mi è parso un po' insipido - questo secondo romanzo con protagonista Fenoglio mi è piaciuto moltissimo. Prima di tutto perché c'è uno studio approfondito sulle associazioni di stampo mafioso pugliesi, con descrizioni di tutti i rituali e delle regole. Poi perché il libro è ambientato nella primavera/estate del 1992, con le due note stragi a Capaci e in via Amelio, che influiscono per forza sui nostri personaggi.
Certo, la soluzione è davvero agrodolce e, purtroppo, davvero realistica...
Certo, la soluzione è davvero agrodolce e, purtroppo, davvero realistica...
December 11, 2019
Annata assai singolare quella del 1992: alle tristissime vicende legate ai giudici Falcone e Borsellino si intrecciano quelle di un bambino rapito come ostaggio ai fini di un riscatto. Non un bambino qualunque, chiaro, ma membro di una delle famiglie mafiose di Bari. Al maresciallo Fenoglio e ai suoi colleghi spetterà il compito di risolvere questo caso.
Scritto benissimo, peccato solo che non mi abbia preso come speravo. Tre stelle e mezzo.
Scritto benissimo, peccato solo che non mi abbia preso come speravo. Tre stelle e mezzo.
October 3, 2020
Davvero bello questo secondo romanzo con protagonista il maresciallo Fenoglio. Il primo mi aveva molto delusa, qui invece il riscatto è evidente. Bella trama, cattivi convincenti, un pentito intelligente anche se crudele, e tanti tantissimi chiaroscuri. Consigliato.
January 1, 2024
Abituato a romanzi più ricchi di azione, mi sono trovato per la prima volta di fronte ad un romanzo che ben mischia la dimensione dell’indagine poliziesca, con le riflessioni introspettive del protagonista. Coinvolgente e scorrevole. Consigliato!!
January 28, 2024
La scrittura di Carofiglio non delude mai, scorrevole e piena di spunti di riflessione.
December 18, 2021
in questo libro si passa sa un dramma interiore del protagonista, ad un dramma narrativo di cronaca nera passando da due drammatici episodi della nostra storia nazionale.
Con un Fenoglio sempre alla ricerca di una propria pace interiore e la ricerca della verità!
Con un Fenoglio sempre alla ricerca di una propria pace interiore e la ricerca della verità!
August 10, 2017
Endnu en fremragende krimi fra Carofiglio's sikre hånd. Denne gang ikke om forsvarsadvokaten Guido Guerrieri, men om politmanden Fenoglio og en velfortalt historie om Bari's mafia. Af en eller anden grund har forlaget udgivet anden del i serien, som del 1 på dansk!!!
June 19, 2018
The Cold Summer is a police procedural that takes place in Italy during the time when the mafia waged open war on the police and the courts, including bombing two judges. Author Gianrico Carofiglio writes from personal experience. He was an anti-mafia prosecutor and judge. This story opens as an internecine mafia conflict seems to be erupting in Bari. the capital of Puglia, right at the top of Italy’s heel. Even though it’s not near the epicenter of Mafia power, the Mafia still holds a lot of power in the city.
But this intrafamilial war took a nasty turn when the local leader’s son was kidnapped. Who would dare? When the young boy’s body is found, it suddenly becomes far too ugly.
The investigation was largely directed by Marshal Fenoglio of the Carabinieri, a reserved and formal man who seems incorruptible, though compassionate. He works hard and trusts the process of shoe leather, research, talking to people, and listening. It seems to work pretty well in leading him to the leader of the faction rebelling against the local boss. Although it seems so very certain he must have been the kidnapper, he denies it and Fenoglio thinks he just might be telling the truth. So while the rest of the Carabinieri think the case is settled, he and his partner keep on investigating.
I enjoyed The Cold Summer quite a bit. While some parts were a bit too legalistic, presenting the interrogation as questions and answers without the usual cajoling, narrowing in on the facts, looking for inconsistencies, so it felt like a finished transcript, not a real interrogation. Sometimes certain statues were explained in quoted text and analysis. He’s writing what he knows too literally. But this is more than counterbalanced by the wonderful conversations between Fenoglio and his colleague Pellecchia. They talk about the indistinct boundaries between right and wrong, really, they talk about life.
I have to mention the translator Howard Curtis. The translation is so smooth that it feels as though it were written in English. More than that, he is able to retain the poetry that I imagine the original most hold when Fenoglio sees the sky as a tragic blue. There are these active metaphors such as when Fenoglio has an early morning swim and leaves before the hot sun begins to eat his skin. Fenoglio is a reader and a thinker (or more accurately Carofiglio is) and it’s wonderful to listen to him thinking. I am looking forward to many more by this author.
I received a copy of The Cold Summer from the publisher through Edelweiss. It will be released on Sept 4th.
The Cold Summer at Bitter Lemon Press
Gianrico Carofiglio on Wikipedia
★★★★
https://tonstantweaderreviews.wordpre...
But this intrafamilial war took a nasty turn when the local leader’s son was kidnapped. Who would dare? When the young boy’s body is found, it suddenly becomes far too ugly.
The investigation was largely directed by Marshal Fenoglio of the Carabinieri, a reserved and formal man who seems incorruptible, though compassionate. He works hard and trusts the process of shoe leather, research, talking to people, and listening. It seems to work pretty well in leading him to the leader of the faction rebelling against the local boss. Although it seems so very certain he must have been the kidnapper, he denies it and Fenoglio thinks he just might be telling the truth. So while the rest of the Carabinieri think the case is settled, he and his partner keep on investigating.
I enjoyed The Cold Summer quite a bit. While some parts were a bit too legalistic, presenting the interrogation as questions and answers without the usual cajoling, narrowing in on the facts, looking for inconsistencies, so it felt like a finished transcript, not a real interrogation. Sometimes certain statues were explained in quoted text and analysis. He’s writing what he knows too literally. But this is more than counterbalanced by the wonderful conversations between Fenoglio and his colleague Pellecchia. They talk about the indistinct boundaries between right and wrong, really, they talk about life.
I have to mention the translator Howard Curtis. The translation is so smooth that it feels as though it were written in English. More than that, he is able to retain the poetry that I imagine the original most hold when Fenoglio sees the sky as a tragic blue. There are these active metaphors such as when Fenoglio has an early morning swim and leaves before the hot sun begins to eat his skin. Fenoglio is a reader and a thinker (or more accurately Carofiglio is) and it’s wonderful to listen to him thinking. I am looking forward to many more by this author.
I received a copy of The Cold Summer from the publisher through Edelweiss. It will be released on Sept 4th.
The Cold Summer at Bitter Lemon Press
Gianrico Carofiglio on Wikipedia
★★★★
https://tonstantweaderreviews.wordpre...
September 24, 2018
The Cold Summer is based on a true story that took place in Italy in 1992. I'm uncertain how much, apart from the assassinations of the two judges, but it all felt believable.
I know nothing at all about the activities of the mafia in Italy nor their relationship with the police. It appeared that they had more power and were feared more than anybody else. The levels of corruption were staggering.
There are two sides to the novel. The investigation by the Carabinieri, in particular Fenoglio and Pellechia and an account by an informant who has been accused of having a hand in the kidnap and killing of Grimaldi's son. This account is chilling, he goes into detail about his levels of progression through the hierarchy in the Mafia and also because it appears that to torture and kill is an everyday occurrence where remorse isn't necessary. I have never read anything like this before and it did make me feel on edge.
I liked both Fenoglio and Pellechia, their relationship worked even though they were completely different. Fenoglio is above-board, not one to use violence or accept bribes. He has personal problems but has to put them to one side to deal with work. Pellechia is not as honest but he does acknowledge that he doesn't always do the right thing. In some ways I preferred him, he was a lot easier to understand.
It was fascinating to read. It is one that I had to read slower than usual so I could absorb what was happening in the different layers, especially in the police investigation. Power and control and a total lack of disregard for anybody who worked on the side of law were basically ignored and not even the family of the kidnapped child would cooperate. I found it interesting that there was more focus on the ones who were on the periphery, the ones who knew how their lives could alter if they fell from favour.
This is the first book that I have read about the mafia and the first I have read by this author. I do plan on reading more of both soon.
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