The Book of Homes

Finalist for the Strega Prize

“Bajani’s episodic, nonlinear narrative traces one man’s memories and rites of passage through a series of northern Italian homes, from infancy in 1976 to 21st-century adulthood.” —The Millions

"This lush narrative is a memorable tale of a man shaped by the walls around him." —Publishers Weekly

"A real writer, a real artistic style, and a world in itself."—Mircea Cartarescu 

"Andrea Bajani, explores, as no one has done before him, that place in the world where we have discovered the most and loved the most, where we have been hurt the most and where, finally, we have become ourselves." —Sandro Veronesi

"Il libro delle case is a tough, illuminating investigation into finding other answers to the same question.  “Who are you?” we’re often asked. And we are also our homes." —Claudia Durastanti

"One of today's best and most versatile writers. With this new work, Andrea Bajani offers surprising and magnificent narrative images. Images that portrays the depths of pain, pleasure, tragedy, nostalgia or pure comedy and amazement typical of human beings."—Mercedes Monmany, ABC Culturàl

"The Book of Homes is the most original book I have read in the last twenty years. Although it is very understandable in its poetic and sweetness, the most receptive reader will be caught in a puzzle trap that is by no means simple: reconstructing the author's biography. At the same time, the author doubles as a reserved narrator and I, the literary hero. Sometimes the descriptions of the author's houses come with a blueprint copy. The name of the town or place where the house is located is often included, and the year in which the author stayed there is always indicated - but even these specific information are not enough to reconstruct author's real life. The book of houses represents a thinly concealed autobiography, in which the main role is given neither to the author nor to the ego, but to the houses, the living, all concrete spaces, which, mysteriously, the reader perceives as dreams." —Dubravka Ugrešić

"With Il libro delle case, Andrea Bajani recounts his "life as a man," and at the same time--by entering the homes that the narrative I lives in over the years--he captures the small and large upheavals (fears and burning desires, betrayed expectations and the longing for redemption) that pepper the inner life of each of us, that no one knows a thing about. Marriage, divorce, parents, children, escapes, returns, uprootings, unresolved conflicts with our loved ones. All of this as time goes by, changing our perception of the world (and of others, and ourselves). And in the background, the story of Italy. Only the living walk steadily beside the spectre of possible failure, and only those hopeful for an authentic relationship with others can speak so well of the loneliness surrounding us all." —Nicola Lagioia

"I believe that the readers of my books and also those of Andrea Bajani are like this: they don't read for information but to enter into a relationship with the language." —Richard Ford, Corriere della sera

"I was very sensitive to this intimate portrait with its universal echoes. A highly literary and ambitious work. The emotion, the poetry, the beauty that radiates from this reconstruction of identity make this novel a very successful endeavor, all the richer for being the bearer of a beautiful reflection on memory and time." —Julia Nannicelli, Editions Gallimard

"The book is of absolute beauty, and tackles the idea of identity from an original and subtle perspective, with both a gentleness and a strength that amazed us." —Aniol Rafel Borrell, Periscopi

"High-quality storytelling and subtle form are intertwined in Il libro delle case. It’s a rare beauty that immediately won us over." —Silvia Sesé, Anagrama

"I am always looking for authors with a distinctive literary voice and an oeuvre that is growing. For me Andrea Bajani is one of the most gifted authors in the world, I loved his books that were translated in German and I absolutely love the idea of this new novel." —Daniel Kampa, Kampa Verlag

"High quality fiction and subtle form are wowen together in The Book of Homes. It is rare. That is why." —Volkan Çelebi, Monokl

"The Book of Homes is a book belonging to each and every one of us, we all have one or several homes, they change as we change, and piles of things that remind us of our past and the pasts of our families. How to cope with too much past and too many things, how to carry the emotional burden is something of which literature speaks best, and Andrea Bajani’s novel is a liberating, magnificently crafted house of words speaking about all our homes: present, past and future ones." —Seid Serdarević, Fraktura

Praise for Andrea Bajani

"Bajani’s writing is ambitious and has an unstoppable energy.”—Enrique Vila-Matas

"One of the best contemporary Italian authors." —Jhumpa Lahiri

"Together with Rachel Cusk, Ottessa Moshfeg, Annie Ernaux, Joyce Carol Oates, Richard Powers, Andrea Bajani is one of the writers I admire the most." —Edmund White

"An author who doesn’t let anything get away." —Colm Toibin