Title: Wintry, pp146
Author: Dario Voltolini
Publisher: La nave di Teseo
Rigths sold in Spain (Libros del Asteroide), France (Éditions Sous sol), Egypt (Logha Publishing), UK (New Cross Press)
Spagna (Libros del Asteroide)
Francia ( Éditions Sous Sol)
Egitto (Logha Publishing)
UK (New Cross Press).
Awards
- Strega Prize 2024: second place
- Flaiano Award 2024 award: finalist
- Lussu Award 2024 award: winner
- Wondy Award 2024 award: winner
- Valle d'Aosta Award 2024: winner
- Bergamo Award 2025: finalist
Author of short stories, novels, radio plays, songs and librettos for the theatre, Dario Voltolini (Turin, 1959) has written, among others, “A metropolitan intuition”, “Rincorse”, “Waveforms”, “10”, “Primaverile”, “The monkeys have inadvertently left the cage”, “Foravìa”, “Pacific Palisades”.
For the publishing house La nave di Teseo he wrote “II Giardino degli Aranci”, Invernale (second in the 2024 Strega Prize), Su (a collection of wide-ranging interventions on culture (2025) and for Baldini + Castoldi, Dagli undici metri (2025).
“Literary mastery, torment, restrained anger, beauty, despair, and humility. The final pages of this book will bring tears to your eyes.”
Antonio Moresco, author of Songs of Chaos
Reading Dario Voltolini makes one think that one could do without the world: his words alone are enough—his brilliant descriptions, capable of capturing things and making them shine like no one else can.
Tiziano Scarpa - Strega Prize
“Winter” is a powerful novel that sweeps you away and lifts you up, grabs you by the shoulders, and stares you straight in the eyes—and Voltolini is a great writer; there’s just no getting around it.
Sandro Veronesi - Two-time Strega Prize winner
The gaze of the twenty-year-old son is imbued with humanity, wrapped in modesty; never judgmental, it skims like a swallow over his parents’ lives and ultimately penetrates them. He questions evil, shares his suffering with us, and caresses and weeps for his father, page after page. One senses respect, intelligence, and kindness. Winter is a novel written in a state of grace, imbued with brilliant reflections, overflowing with love and great respect. Federica De Paolis
Title: The Bush
Author: Dario Voltolini
Publisher: Aboca Edizioni,pp. 112, 2026
Rights: r.vivian Literary agency
A contemporary ecological fable: a bush embarks on a journey around the world through a series of adventures and twists that draw the reader in as well.
.. but — there's also something kinetic
in this fantastic novel that
It doesn't look like anything ordinary.
Voltolini the narrator is not caged-
bile in no category. Realist
imaginary, science fiction
reverse, minimalist maximal-
is? It's hard to say, since its inception.
of with a metropolitan intuition-
na (1990) and Waveforms (1996) ha
every time surprised readers and critics
with different narrative styles but all
you graft yourself, like his bush,
in a light linguistic thickness
very difficult and at the same time com-
plexus. A lexical wealth and
syntactic which here becomes a conti-
new amazing firework
you. His tongue rolls and twists
to the rhythm of the journey of the tangle of
branches, leaves and seeds that it bears down
ro — it is the bush that chases the
narrator or on the contrary is he the vo-
this narrator who chases the form
vegetable? »Only in a vacuum can they
there are full ones", says one
of the voices — Marco Belpoliti-Robinson
It rolls, ceaselessly, through deserts and abandoned cities. The wind propels it: the same wind that whispers unheard stories, while the sun burns and the sand blinds. It is a bush: an unlikely yet irresistible storyteller, a silent witness to violence, mystery, and human secrets. Day after day, amid violent storms and downpours, it flies, falls, bounces, and flies again. And every fall is an act of liberation, every roll an epiphany. From the Mojave Desert to the island of Giglio, from the rugged rocks of the Karst to Crete, this rootless traveler narrates, observes, and reflects with an unusual yet entirely plausible voice. The reader is captivated by its hypnotic movement and cannot put it down: until a poignant final crescendo leads this brief and tense novel into the realm of fantasy literature. After *Invernale*—an acclaimed finalist for the Strega Prize—Dario Voltolini returns to craft a seemingly minimalist story, made up of few but memorable elements.
At a certain point in its journey, the bush finds itself stuck in a turbine on a cargo ship bound for Jordan. Its entire conversation with the seaweed, unable to move and therefore anxious, reminded me so much of contemporary issues that address the themes of freedom, movement, and what we can and cannot do, authorized by powers we cannot see yet who, however, choose for us (just like the wind).
I really enjoyed reading The Bush, and it also made me think: Voltolini instills in us the doubt that, as human beings, we are not the only ones with the capacity to think, to choose, and to engage in complex reasoning. And when the one speaking is a fragile ball of hay and branches, the sweetness is multiplied.
Deborah D'Addetta
https://www.criticaletteraria.org/2026/06/dario-voltolini-il-cespuglio-aboca.html
Dario Voltolini, The Bush | Literature | Rai Cultura https://share.google/WOq0AJ6LUyDGXSXPD
The Bush is not a novel for those seeking a traditional plot full of twists and turns or realistic characters in the most conventional sense of the word. Instead, it is a work that invites contemplation, reflection, and imagination. Voltolini constructs a modern philosophical fable, a tale that speaks of the world and human beings through the unlikely yet extraordinarily effective voice of a plant carried by the wind.
https://www.dallacartalloschermo.com/post/recensione-il-cespuglio-dario-voltolini
The Bush, Dario Voltolini, Aboca. A precious, brilliant, experimental, visionary, and poetic gem, its symbolic protagonist being a tumbleweed, a rootless bush that the wind carries across the world, bearing witness to its contradictions. A fable about freedom, nature, and beauty, with a resonant literary voice, absolutely unmissable: a balm for the soul.
Gabriele Ottaviani - Blog on WordPress.com.
I haven’t mentioned—and it bears noting—that I, too, smiled while reading *Il cespuglio*, because Dario Voltolini possesses a clear and agile intellect, capable of expressing itself through humor that is both effective and very gentle, and with a mastery of words and syntax that amazes with every line.
Sometimes, all it takes is a change of perspective to breathe new life into what might seem obvious. It's one of the first things they teach in creative writing courses, and perhaps it's no coincidence, given that the author of this book, light as a feather and thick as a stick of butter, is a professor at one of the most renowned in our country. - Stefano Bonazzi
Titolo: Quasi una robinia
Autore: Marta Cai
Editore: Aboca Edizioni, 2026, pp160
Diritti: r.vivian literary agency
Marta Cai was born in Canelli in 1980. In 2019, she debuted with the short story collection Enti di ragione (SuiGeneris Editions). In 2023, she published her novel Centomilioni (Einaudi), which won the Campiello Prize - Jury of Literary Experts, the short story Tipo psicanalisi (Tetra Editions), and the collection Brasilampi (hopefulmonster Editions). She has published in magazines (inutile, Il reportage, Kaiserpanorama) and participated in anthologies (Ti racconto una canzone, Arcana 2022, tReMa vol. 3, Arcoiris Editions, Splendere ai margine, Oligo Editions).
Can a tree, a symbol of life, initiate a meditation on loss, provide the language to speak of "those who no longer speak"? Yes, if it was the silent witness to the last days of a father's life, a contradictory and paradoxical witness, as only the deepest and most mysterious bonds can be: invasive and pioneering, widespread yet not native, honey-producing, ornamental, domesticated yet bristling with thorns, the Black Locust presents itself as a daughter, with a name that is a surname, and as a pseudo-acacia, a quasi-mimosa, an almost-female, something that never quite becomes what it seems. Through a narrative punctuated by the actions that give the chapters their titles, Marta Cai's new novel intertwines confessions and memories, failed gestures and words spoken in silence, reflections on illness and the precarious community that forms within the walls of a hospice, in an attempt to formulate an "almost" balance between fading and sprouting.
Gessica Franco Carlevero was born in Canale in 1980 and lives in Marseille.
She directs the literary magazine La Bibliothèque italienne, a project aimed at promoting contemporary Italian literature in France, and works as a communications and marketing manager for a winery.
Among his publications, the novel Metà Guaro metà Grappa, Fandango, 2006 (Awarded at the Budapest First Novel Festival), the texts on creative writing Meravigliosamente and A mente libera (Einaudi Scuola) and several collections published among others in Panta (Bompiani), L'Accalappiacani (Derive e Approdi), L'immaginazione, effe and L'inquieto.
Title: The Hole, forthcoming
Author: Gessica Franco Carlevero
Publisher: Sellerio Editore, 225, pp 224
Rights: r.vivian literary agency
https://www.dallacartalloschermo.com/post/recensione-il-buco-gessica-franco-carlevero
Reading this novel raises many questions, including this: is there still an adult life to describe for an entire generation that has no future to call home?
An original and truthful novel that I recommend to anyone who wants to better understand the new generation.
Thirty-five years old and a hole in her head the size of a glass.
The protagonist began pulling out her hair as a child, when her father went into hiding because of gambling debts and her mother began a relationship with a violent, emotionally unstable underage boy.
Some children live adult lives, waiting for time to pass, invisible to others and to themselves. They grow up unprepared and helpless, with the sole imperative of not repeating what they have experienced.
After graduating, the protagonist doesn’t know which direction to take and starts dating Giacomo, a Venetian guy she meets by chance.
Seven months into her pregnancy, for no apparent reason and without knowing a word of French, they loaded their suitcases into a van and set off for Marseille.
And at that point, motherhood proves more difficult than expected. Inconsistencies emerge between the idea of an imaginary motherhood and the reality of the situation, as well as her memories of herself as a daughter.
In her new role as mother and wife, the protagonist finds herself facing situations her mother had faced in the past, with every determination not to repeat the pattern, despite herself.
And the absence of her father, who never returned, and of her mother—absent yet present—continues to manifest itself in that void in her mind.
A tic, they said at first; trichotillomania, she discovered much later—a testament to the past that influences the present despite her desire to avoid it.
But what makes Gessica Franco Carlevero’s novel so vibrant and, in its own way, luminous, is the language. A language that bends and adapts to the disordered, acute, tender, and sharp thoughts of its protagonist. Irma’s voice is real, alive, incandescent. It accompanies you through her reflections as she breastfeeds, as she writes, as she argues, as she observes the world from her small, vast “hole.” And it is not a voice created for pleasure. It is a voice that questions and that lingers.
Title: The Island and Time
Author: Claudia Lanteri
Publisher: Einaudi, 2024, pp 350
Rights sold to: Folio Verlag in Germany
Métaillé éditions in France.
Claudia Lanteriwas born in Caltanissetta. Her parents, who founded a Teatro Stabile here, passed on to her a passion for stories from a very young age.
After graduating in Modern Literature in Palermo, she continued his studies in Rome with a master's degree for creative professions from the Luiss Business School. She lived in London for five years, collaborating with various fashion, theatre, cooking and sports companies as an artworker and web designer. Since 2015 she has returned to live in Sicily, where she works as a consultant in the field of strategic communication and digital innovation, combining her humanistic education with the visual skills consolidated abroad.
Passionate about photography and literary criticism, she would like to write much more fiction and fewer editorial plans. The Empty Island is his first novel
In this insular thriller, where a tight plot meets powerful literary writing, the events unfold in a time that is both defined (the 1960s) and undefined, in a certain sense mobile: a time in which everything continues to happen, in which the past blends with the present.
An anomalous event, after the initial disturbance, is reduced to nothing, incorporated into the habits and immutable rhythms of the inhabitants of a small community.
But not for Nofriu, who is unable to resume his old life and who remains forever tied – along with the reader – to the unsolved enigma.
Appreciated by critics and the public, the book has found great resonance abroad: the translation into French (Éditions Métailié) and into German (Folio Verlag) are in progress.
Title: The anecdote of the calchi
Author: Maria Teresa Rovitto
Publisher: Terrarossa editore, 2026, 174
Rights: r.vivian literary agency
Maria Teresa Rovitto was born in Basilicata in 1987. She has published in magazines such as Nazione Indiana, Argo, In allarmata radura, and in the anthologies L'ordine sostitutiva (déclic editions) and L'ora senza ombre (Pidgin Editions). She won the pordenonelegge Debut competition with the collection Beautiful Feet – جميلة أقدام (La Gialla – Samuele Editore). L'aneddoto dei calchi (TerraRossa Editions, April 2026) is her first novel.
Livia’s life begins to unravel following Vanessa Beecroft’s performance VB66, which depicts the charred bodies from the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD. After losing her job and ending her relationship with Bruno, she befriends the drag queen Patty and comes to terms with the void left by Zoa, who has returned to Greece to become an artist. The two friends’ participation in the tableau vivant thus marks a turning point for both: Zoa will radicalize her way of being in the world, while Livia will redefine her relationship with her own body and with her father’s illness. Maria Teresa Rovitto’s debut film is a reflection on art and its impact on people’s lives, on the search for self in relation to one’s own expectations and those of others, and is striking both for the maturity of its ideas and for its elliptical, literary, and nonconformist style.
A reflection on contemporary art, an intimate and painful story, and writing of the highest quality. More than just a debut, Maria Teresa Rovitto’s *L'anecdoto dei calchi* explores the body, the meaning of identity, what it means to “duplicate” life through art, and the price one must pay.
Stefano Bonazzi on Satisfiction:
https://www.satisfiction.eu/maria-teresa-rovitto-laneddoto-dei-calchi/
Laura Pugno for the Noun, Verb, Adjective, and Adverb column in Words and Things:
https://www.leparoleelecose.it/nome-verbo-aggettivo-avverbio-14-maria-teresa-rovitto/
Giorgia Tribuiani (Alba Adriatica, 1985) is a writer and creative writing teacher. She has published the textbook Scrivere il perturbante (Scrivere il perturbante, 2023) and the novels Guasti (Guasti, 2018), Blu (Blu, 2021), and Padri (Padri, 2022). The English translation of Padri, by Isabella Corletto, won the PEN/HEIM Award for Translation. The rights to Padri were purchased in Ukraine (Anetta Antonenko Publishers).
Seventeen blackbirds playing a macabre game. Five days to find a solution. An entire village forced to reveal its secrets to save the life of one of its inhabitants. A dark tale of suspicion, fear, and human frailty.
With Pezzi, Giorgia Tribuiani writes a dark tale reminiscent of the Salem Fires and the Spoon River Confessions. A choral story about memory as a form of collective responsibility, illuminating human fears and frailties, but also the solidarity that can arise in a situation of extreme terror.
Title: Pieces
Author: Giorgia Tribuiani
Publisher: Il Saggiatore, 2026, pp. 320
Rights: R. Vivian Literary Agency
With Pezzi, Giorgia Tribuiani writes a dark tale reminiscent of the Salem Fires and the Spoon River Confessions. A choral story about memory as a form of collective responsibility, illuminating human fears and frailties, but also the solidarity that can arise in a situation of extreme terror.
https://ilpostodelleparole.it/libri/giorgia-tribuiani-pezzi/
The fundamental question is: what happens to a community when it is forced to look within itself?
As in King's novels, even in the village of G. no one is spared: each inhabitant has a secret to hide that will contribute, through a chain of coincidences, to the final massacre, during which only the sacrifice of an innocent will be able to bring back
The index of books of the month-l.. Rcsio teaches
contemporary Italian literature
at the University of Turin
“Pezzi” is a complex novel, decidedly more complex than Tribuiani’s previous works. It is a novel that unfolds through intertwining and overlapping elements, in which obsessive and unsettling motifs blend with an almost gothic atmosphere and a narrative tension constantly pushed to the limit. It is a novel that does not aim to reassure the reader; on the contrary, it does the exact opposite. Its goal is to keep the reader on edge until the very end.
David Valentini - Literary Critic
https://www.criticaletteraria.org/2026/04/giorgia-tribuiani-pezzi-il-saggiatore.html
"Great book [...] A hard book, but surprisingly hilarious." - Margherita Oggeto, TuttoLibri (La Stampa)
"Delicious, bright, vibrant." - Conventional
“ The ridiculous age is a novel that seems like a long conversation between different generations in which, however, the problems are always there, halfway between love and pain. [...] A novel that wants to underline how much the meaning of growing up is transversal to age, to ways of being and becoming. "
"A novel with a hilarious, amusing, but never banal plot, in which an accurate investigation of human behavior, the conflict between different cultures, the true value of love and loneliness are mixed." - About the Novel
Title: The Ridiculous Age
Author: Margherita Giacobino
Publisher: Mondadori, 2018, pp. 271
Rights: r.vivian literary agency
Translated into English by Dedalus with the support of Cepell
