Ties

Very good service!

Ties is short and relatively quick, but it is deep. It is the story not of how a marriage breaks up, but how a reconciliation of sorts comes to be and how the marriage continues for decades. The book begins with a series of frantic, wordy letters from wife to husband who has left the home for another woman whom he loves. The second part of the book (the longest, I believe) is the narrative of the husband relating his life and his wife's life over the 40 years of the the marriage post-reconciliation. The third part is a conversation between the two middle-aged children who reflect back on their parents and plan for the future. (This all sound bland, but I want to avoid spoilers.)Personally, I think that a major theme in this book is the concept of identity. In this sense, the book is nihilistic: the characters cannot find lasting "ties" to their own selves, and the idea of a fixed identity and therefore real and lasting ties to others is exploded, no matter the outward circumstances of the characters' lives. This leaves the third part in which the ties are financial only and other ties are deconstructed. The "title scene," as it were, described in part two and discussed in part three, is one in which the children ask their Dad when or how he taught them to tie their shoelaces. (The book's title in Italian is "Lacci" which means "shoelaces.") It turns out that this scene, so emotional for the Dad, turns out to have been a manipulation set in motion by the Mom. The Dad IMO feels this emotional moment as a "tie" --- maybe the lesson on tying shoelace bows is something real.Mixed in with this overarching theme are the changes, the regrets, the altered behavior, etc. that lasts for all of the forty years after the reconciliation. Whom do I love? Whom do I care about? Is self-sacrificing revenge part of the equation?To close, I thought this was a somewhat scary book. One has heard that the foundation of all things Italian is the web of family life. Here, I think there's a bleak destruction of that idea.Skip the translator's introduction. IMO it is total b.s. and woo-woo.Lawrence says: Read it!

I wrote in the margins and underlined a lot in this book, something I haven't done in a while, and something that I don't do unless I'm driven to. One line that took my breath: "It's hard to suffer politely" is so indicative of this book and its deep water dive into relationships-- between husband and wife, between parent and child, and between the conscience and the self. No one in this book really suffers politely and that's the power of the prose, the ability to allow the reader to see that suffering full frontal. But it's not just about suffering; this book is not afraid to show desire, obsession, regret, and love.The one potential downside is the trigger factor. Certain conversations in this book hit like a sharp bullet right underneath the ribs. So it may make you "go there," to places that you forgot existed but were merely filed away, waiting to be tapped and accessed with brutally authentic prose, memories that piss you off, damage that you thought was bulletproof, yet by the end it's not a masochistic exercise but a full-blown cathartic release . So I'm guessing the crap, guilt, anger, love that most of us go through with parents, with children, with selfish or hurt and sadistic spouses is unfortunately universal.Jhumpa Lahiri's intro is a good and insightful read on its on. God bless her for translating this book and offering her very necessary and fascinating interpretation of Starnone's Lacci.

I read Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante first and was bowled over by her painfully honest first person narrator's reaction to being left by her husband. In the course of recommending it to a friend, she told me that her husband had preferred Ties, so I had to read this book. I recommend that you read both. They're both by Italian writers and when read in tandem, reveal stark gender differences. Ties is from the point of view of first the wife then the husband. The wife suffers by comparison to Ferrante's —in the long letter to her husband contained in Book One, she exists by turns apologetic or hysterical — but the husband is much more interesting, though I disliked his self-obsession and dishonest decisions almost to the point where I quit reading. What happens is depressing and threatening to their children's well-being, with both descending into their worst selves. What saved the story for me was the ending, Book Three, which is from the now adult children's point of view. The twist is a laugh out loud and makes the parents a bit more sympathetic, so in the end, I do recommend this short, well written book.

I was in the mood for Italian and I had read that this author was thought by some to maybe be the person behind the Elena Ferrante pseudonym. Wasn't sure what to expect but l enjoyed the ride. Didn't figure it out but liked the three book structure. It all created great visuals in my noggin so I think it would make for a good movie. I'd love to see the show lace scene.

I heard about this via word of mouth, and then when I looked it up, was surprised I'd missed the review coverage. Maybe the review coverage is riding on the Ferrante coat-tails a bit, but either way this is a slim volume that you can read in one sitting, and yet makes quite an impression. It's not loud or splashy, more like a quiet, forceful monologue from mostly just one character, who is more intriguing than likable. The 'mystery' we're chasing is fairly nominal, and yet I found it absolutely page-turning. There is an intensity of character that just makes you want to stay immersed.

Although I thought it was a thoughtful book, it was too neat, too mechanical, in construction, and I concluded overall that Domenico Starnone is not Elena Ferrante.

The father gives his children no small impact.The daughter hates him, the son looks after him in　that he is woomanizer, but they are still family.The constitution of the story is interesting, and we know who stole their cat in the end.

An outstanding achievement, a deep, stunning story, treated from a number of significant perspectives, and rendered with utmost sensitivity, compassion and love of truth. A masterpiece.

I'm a big fan of Jhumpa Lahiri so I picked up this book. Soon I got smitten by this story thanks to her. This is a story about a tie that holds a messed up family together. I found a bit of hope left among all those agony and sorrow. The fact that all family members chose to get back together made me think about the small world called family you're committed to and have responsibility. It was beautiful story.

I was disappointed