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Two intense, enthralling, and heartbreaking stories unravel over half a century, centering on two women who pay a price in blood and pain for the fault of being born in Orolé, where the inevitability of evil and death are the inhabitants’ only certainties. In the town of Orolé, for as long as anyone can remember the cemetery of Chirila has played host to a sealed tomb with a nameless gravestone. No one has ever had the courage to open it and unveil the deceased’s identity, but everyone indulges in inventing stories and legends about what might be behind the matter. Little do the know that secretly buried there were the bodies of Bore Crapittu and, previously, of Gabriele Comelli, a surveyor who had come all the way from continental Italy.
A consummate literary storyteller brings to life authentic local characters, betrayals, jealousies and crisscrossing vendettas that envelop us in the spell of a magical land.


Salvatore Niffoi (Orani, 1950) is one of Italy’s most important writers. His other works include Cristolu (il Maestrale, 2001), La leggenda di Redenta Tiria (Adelphi, 2005), La vedova scalza (Adelphi, 2006, winner of the Campiello Prize), Ritorno a Baraulle (Adelphi, 2007, later Il pane di Abele, Adelphi, 2009), Pantumas (Feltrinelli, 2012), La quinta stagione è l’inferno (Feltrinelli, 2014). With Giunti Editore he has published Il venditore di metafore (2017) and Il cieco di Ortakos (2019).

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