The book ladder is the pinnacle of achievement for any aspiring book lover. Gliding along a railing system parallel to the bookcase, it is the finishing touch that completes any library, whether public or personal. Its presence makes tangible an embrace of learning, represented by a wall of needlessly high books anchored by the most specialized of ladders. It signals to guests that you’ve ostensibly read so many books and acquired so much alleged knowledge that you need extra assistance to get to it.
Throughout, Sittenfeld successfully deploys her brand of low-key, sardonic wit, which combines a clever and sensitive understanding of the pleasure and the pain of nostalgia. And fans of her boarding-school novel of 20 years ago, Prep, will be thrilled at the return of Lee Fiora, whom she pitches into that most dreaded of social gatherings, the school reunion. No spoilers, but suffice to say that Lost But Not Forgotten will be a balm to tortoises everywhere.
James Cahill’s debut novel, Tiepolo Blue, was full of interesting things but weakened by implausibilities. In his second novel, he gets around this by setting it in the world of modern art, where the implausible and ridiculous are de rigueur.
As someone who has spent a fair bit of time in the Eternal City, I can say that in order to truly love Rome, you have to hate it first—maybe a little, maybe a lot. Many parts are overrun with tourists, things frequently don’t work, or don’t work the way you want them to, and the place has been around so long that, ultimately, it doesn’t care much whether you like it or not.
Rafael Alberti certainly had a love-hate relationship with the city, which is what makes the poems in Rome: Pedestrians Beware (Roma: Peligro para caminantes) so alive—and often quite comic.
Although we want to believe that we’re doing our bit for the planet in selecting the correct bins each week, all too often, it seems, we’re simply relocating the problem far away and leaving it with the voiceless poor.