Niccolo Ammaniti

Kylee Doust

Attending a gala at the private home of a real estate magnate, a neurotic author stumbles on the activities of a satanic sect planning to launch itself into infamy by staging an apocalyptic meltdown at the height of the festivities.

Let the Games Begin

I'm Not Scared

Jonathan Hunt

Growing up in a tiny, remote Italian village, Pietro is ignored by his parents and suffers the torment of bullies, with only his best friend Gloria for solace, but the arrival of an aging playboy, Graziano Biglia, turns both of their lives upside down and prompts Pietro to realize that only by leaving home can he become the man he should be. Reprint.

I'll Steal You Away

Come dio comanda

One relentlessly hot summer, six children explore the scorched wheat fields that enclose their tiny Italian village. When the gang find a dilapidated farmhouse, nine-year-old Michele Amitrano makes a discovery so momentous that he dare not tell a soul. It is a secret that will force Michele to question everything and everyone around him, and will bring his innocent world toppling down. An unputdownable thriller, I'm Not Scared has become a contemporary classic in Italian literature, read and celebrated the world over.

Thirteen-year-old Cristiano Zena lives with his father Rino, a gormless neo-fascist, in a depressed semi-rural area of Italy. Rino and his drinking buddies are planning a ram raid on an ATM using a converted tractor while the wary, adoring Cristiano sits in on their meetings. As he watches their half-baked plans unravel, he daydreams about the unattainable Fabiana Ponticelli. He has no idea that something very, very bad is about to happen. Or that it will change his life forever. Niccolo Ammaniti, author of the loved and acclaimed I'm Not Scared, brings an extraordinary blend of tenderness, buffoonery and violent tragedy to this gritty, compelling novel from Italy's industrial wastelands, translated by Jonathan Hunt. 'These anti-heroes create a fast-paced action thriller...The Crossroads is hard to put down.' Courier Mail

The Crossroads

From the author of the international bestseller, Iâ€TMm Not Scared. Youâ€TMve got to taste the high life once a week, otherwise whatâ€TMs the point of living? In swampy Ischiano Scalo, the grown-ups are losers and the children dream of escape. Pietro is a frustrated eleven-year-old, finding it hard to deal with school bullies and indifferent parents. His only support comes from his pretty friend Gloria and favourite teacher Flora. Graziano, aka Big Biglia, is an ageing Lothario who returns to the village with plans of marriage, though they are soon thwarted. Almost at once this oafish child-man finds another, unsuspecting paramour. In this wild and mordantly funny picaresque tale of small-town life, Ammaniti confirms his status as Italyâ€TMs best young writer.

Steal You Away

Niccolò Ammaniti

It is four years since the virus came, killing every adult in its path. Not long after that the electricity failed. Food and water started running out. Fires raged across the country. Now Anna cares for her brother alone in a house hidden in the woods, keeping him safe from 'the Outside'. But, when the time comes, Anna knows they must leave their world and find another. By turns luminous and tender, gripping and horrifying, Anna is a haunting parable of love and loneliness; of the stories we tell to sustain us, and the lengths we will go to in order to stay alive.

Anna

Sicile, 2020. Un virus mortel, "la Rouge", a déferlé sur l'Europe quatre ans auparavant et décimé la population adulte ; les jeunes, eux, sont protégés jusqu'à l'âge de la puberté. Anna se retrouve seule avec Astor, son petit frère de quatre ans. Elle doit affronter le monde extérieur avec ses cadavres, ses charognards, ses chiens errants et affamés, l'odeur pestilentielle, pour trouver, quand il en reste, des médicaments, des bougies, des piles, des boîtes de conserve, avec comme unique guide dans cette lutte pour la survie, le cahier d'instructions que lui a légué leur mère avant d'être emportée par la maladie. Lorsqu'Astor disparaît, Anna part à sa recherche, prête à défier les bandes d'enfants sauvages qui errent à travers les rues désertes, les centres commerciaux et les bois. Mais l'ordre appartient au passé et les règles d'autrefois ont été oubliées. Pour réussir à sauver Astor, Anna va devoir en inventer de nouvelles, parcourant ce monde à l'abandon où la nature a repris ses droits, ne laissant que les vestiges d'une civilisation qui a couru à sa propre perte. Une véritable odyssée des temps modernes où s'entremêlent lumière et ténèbres, un duel permanent entre la vie et la mort.

Lorenzo Cuni is a fourteen-year-old loner. His wealthy parents think he is away on a school skiing trip, but, in fact, he has stowed himself away in a rarely visited cellar of his parents’ house. Surrounded by video games and tinned food, he is perfectly content in his isolation. Then he gets an unexpected visit from his estranged half-sister, Olivia. Olivia is in her twenties, she’s addicted to heroin, and she needs Lorenzo’s help. Against his better judgment, Lorenzo lets her stay. Over the next week, they form an intense bond. This brief encounter will change the course of both of their lives. From the acclaimed author of I’m Not Scared, this is a compulsive exploration of what families keep behind locked doors.

Niccolo Ammaniti

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