Steven Price

In sun-drenched Sicily, among the decadent Italian aristocracy of the late 1950s, Giuseppe Tomasi, the last prince of Lampedusa, struggles to complete the novel that will be his lasting legacy, The Leopard. With a firm devotion to the historical record, Lampedusa leaps effortlessly into the mind of the writer and inhabits the complicated heart of a man facing down the end of his life, struggling to make something of lasting worth, while there is still time.

A Novel

Lampedusa

Fraser Simons

I liked the writing style and the overall plot, but feel like the book would have been augmented from knowing The Leopard. I got the feeling often that there was a wider, or deeper context I was somehow not privy to because this novel is about the later life of the author of The Leopard, and I’m not familiar with that story. Probably this has contrasting themes. At the very least it’s made me quite curious about the book and I plan to get my hands on a copy. Otherwise though, a sad, old prince, a relic of times past in old Sicily was evocative and sometimes charming. Glad to have read it.

Lampedusa A Novel

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