Friday, February 24, 2012

When the Night-Christina Comencini; Marina Harss (translator)

When the Night


Christina Comencini; Marina Harss (translator)

Other Press, Apr 24 2012, $15.95

ISBN 9781590515112



Feeling like she cannot breath or do anything right, Marina struggles with her husband’s obsessive probing. Needing to escape the glare, Marina, accompanied by her two year old son Marco, goes on a month-long vacation in the Dolomites. Her landlord Manfred, whose wife just left him, prefers a local renter of his upstairs apartment, but in July he settles for the only interested party, the mother and toddler.



Following an accident, Manfred rescues the pair. He intervenes when her son refuses to eat or behave as the misogynist, who detests all women, thinks she is a lousy mother. Yet the two adults have a n attraction to one another in spite of his harsh treatment of her. Fifteen years later, she returns still obsessed over what she dreams should have been.



When The Night is a deep psychological tale that looks into the souls of two mentally wounded warriors who fear relationships because they have failed at them. That profound scrutiny into the minds of the adults is two edged as it brings a powerful focus on motives especially phobic, but also lingers too long keeping the storyline’s pace rather slow. Still fans who enjoy a pensive glimpse into the hearts and souls of the protagonists will want to read Christina Comencini engaging drama while wondering if the memory matches the second time encounter.



Harriet Klausner

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