Simple Prayers

Golding, Michael

ISBN 10: 0446670863 / ISBN 13: 9780446670869

Published by Warner Books, 1996

Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less. Seller Inventory # G0446670863I3N00

Synopsis:

In the 14th century, on an Italian island called Riva di Pignoli, terrible and wonderful things happen. A corpse is washed up on the shore and is quickly hidden; a beautiful stranger arrives in possession of a miraculous secret; and spring fails to arrive.

From the Back Cover: With an original, captivating new voice in American literature, Michael Golding brings us a narrative iridescent with the colors and textures of medieval Italy. Steeped in mystical lore and magical realism, Simple Prayers creates a world we know all too well...a world where nature has been thrown off balance and where the passions and pleasures of daily life may prove fatal. Enter the fourteenth century on an Italian island in the Venice lagoon, a world where superstition reigns, where life and death are created by magical equations, where the land holds simple truths. A corpse with black welts washes up on this rustic island's quiet shores, foreshadowing great change among the villagers who are at once larger than life and more real than the neighbors next door. Here is Albertino, a simple fruit and vegetable vendor whose only luxuries are the cherished ornate boxes he collects. Here is Ermenegilda, the spoiled, obese daughter of the island's only wealthy family, who makes Albertino the unlikely object of her love. Here is Miriam, the exquisite stranger with a secret, who steals hearts of two young men. Here, too, is the ethereal young girl with the power to heal everything but the cruel heart of her own mother. These and the other villagers of Riva di Pignoli create a mesmerizing world of hope and desire even as the specter of the corpse looms from the shadows on the shore. As no one is immune to the change that suddenly permeates the island, no reader will be immune to the transcendent beauty of this magnificent novel.

Bibliographic Details

Title: Simple Prayers
Publisher: Warner Books
Publication Date: 1996
Binding: Paperback
Condition: Good
Dust Jacket Condition: No Jacket