Lost on Me
Longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2024
Published on 3. August 2023
Book
Hardback
224 pages
978-0-349-01766-2 (ISBN)
Description
The prize-winning 100,000-copy Italian bestseller
A 2023 book of the year for the Financial Times, the Irish Times, the New European, Marie Claire and Largehearted Boy
'Deliciously enjoyable' Katherine Heiny
'I adored it' Naoise Dolan
'Wild, funny and disturbing' Roddy Doyle
'Thrillingly original' Monica Ali
'It would be simply impossible for a book this good to go unnoticed' Big Issue
_________________________________
A delightfully funny Italian novel about sex, love, family - and how a writer transforms her life into art
Vero has grown up in Rome with her eccentric family: an omnipresent mother who is devoted to her own anxiety, a father ruled by hygienic and architectural obsessions, and a precocious genius brother at the centre of their attention. As she becomes an adult, Vero's need to strike out on her own leads her into bizarre and comical situations: she tries (and fails) to run away to Paris at the age of fifteen; she moves into an unwitting older boyfriend's house after they have been together for less than a week; and she sets up a fraudulent (and wildly successful) street clothing stall to raise funds to go to Mexico. Most of all, she falls in love - repeatedly, dramatically, and often with the most unlikely and inappropriate of candidates.
As she continues to plot escapades and her mother's relentless tracking methods and guilt-tripping mastery thwart her at every turn, it is no wonder that Vero becomes a writer - and a liar - inventing stories in a bid for her own sanity.
Narrated in a voice as wryly ironic as it is warm and affectionate, Lost on Me seductively explores the slippery relationship between deceitfulness and creativity (beginning with Vero's first artistic achievement: a painting she steals from a school classmate and successfully claims as her own). Deceptively simple, its tenderness offset by moments of cool brutality, Lost on Me is a masterwork of human observation.
A 2023 book of the year for the Financial Times, the Irish Times, the New European, Marie Claire and Largehearted Boy
'Deliciously enjoyable' Katherine Heiny
'I adored it' Naoise Dolan
'Wild, funny and disturbing' Roddy Doyle
'Thrillingly original' Monica Ali
'It would be simply impossible for a book this good to go unnoticed' Big Issue
_________________________________
A delightfully funny Italian novel about sex, love, family - and how a writer transforms her life into art
Vero has grown up in Rome with her eccentric family: an omnipresent mother who is devoted to her own anxiety, a father ruled by hygienic and architectural obsessions, and a precocious genius brother at the centre of their attention. As she becomes an adult, Vero's need to strike out on her own leads her into bizarre and comical situations: she tries (and fails) to run away to Paris at the age of fifteen; she moves into an unwitting older boyfriend's house after they have been together for less than a week; and she sets up a fraudulent (and wildly successful) street clothing stall to raise funds to go to Mexico. Most of all, she falls in love - repeatedly, dramatically, and often with the most unlikely and inappropriate of candidates.
As she continues to plot escapades and her mother's relentless tracking methods and guilt-tripping mastery thwart her at every turn, it is no wonder that Vero becomes a writer - and a liar - inventing stories in a bid for her own sanity.
Narrated in a voice as wryly ironic as it is warm and affectionate, Lost on Me seductively explores the slippery relationship between deceitfulness and creativity (beginning with Vero's first artistic achievement: a painting she steals from a school classmate and successfully claims as her own). Deceptively simple, its tenderness offset by moments of cool brutality, Lost on Me is a masterwork of human observation.
Reviews / Votes
Highly entertaining, thought-provoking and one of 2023's best novels yet * Strong Words * Funny and tender * Financial Times, Best Books of the Year 2023 * Wild, funny and disturbing, all I ask of a book about mothers and their daughters. -- Roddy Doyle * Irish Times, Best Books of 2023 * Excellent ... written in a spare and precise style from the pen of a biting narrator. It would be simply impossible for a book this good to go unnoticed * Big Issue * Remarkable. A darkly funny novel of rhythm, subtlety and nuance ... a writer who deserves as wide an audience as possible * New European * Restless and sly ... intelligently spiky * The Times * I fell head over heels in love with Lost on Me. What a thrillingly original voice! Raimo writes with a tender brutality that is simultaneously hilarious and heartbreaking * Monica Ali, author of Love Marriage * I adored Lost on Me. With combustive prose and oxidising wit, Veronica Raimo sets fire to the Bildungsroman. A clear-eyed comedic talent who bends the novel form to her will -- Naoise Dolan A uproariously funny portrait of an unconventional family from a writer who knows the sliver of ice in the heart as well as she knows love. This deliciously enjoyable novel is a true original and one to savour -- Katherine Heiny When the book you start reading is immediately hilarious and deeply disturbing, you know you're onto something special. Lost on Me is that book -- Roddy Doyle Is it possible, today, to completely reinvent auto-fiction? For Veronica Raimo it clearly is. Get ready to talk about this book for a long, long time -- Paolo Giordano, author of The Solitude of Prime Numbers This book made me want to clear my calendar and read everything of Raimo's I could get my hands on. Incisive, engrossing, and deeply funny -- Julia May Jonas, author of Vladimir Like a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, Veronica Raimo mocks the absurdities of her family life as well as tries to reconcile her own ambiguous feelings. A bold, provocative, and original book -- Lily Tuck, author of Sisters A desecrating and tender portrait of family that reels us in from the very first lines * Io Donna: Il Corriere della Sera * Many pages in this novel are so intense and unscrupulous that one feels the apprehension of being caught spying in a stranger's mailbox * Esquire Italia * Reading this novel is a blast ... Many of the pages are jellyfish stings: they burn on and on -- Claudia Durastanti, author of Strangers I Know Veronica Raimo is a stupendous comedian * La Stampa * A story that nails us down with a powerful first-person voice, clear and exhilarating. * Marie Claire Italia * With its stellar voice, Raimo's inquisitive and vulnerable novel proves tough to put down * Publishers Weekly * Lost on Me is the naughty grandson of Natalia Ginzburg's Family Lexicon ... Raimo has tapped the novelistic potential of her affections and has transformed them into comedy. The result deserves all of the praise flaunted on the cover * Il Corriere della Sera * Filled with humour and neuroses ... a witty and complex portrait of a woman becoming herself * Kirkus * Lost on Me was anything but; I was utterly seduced by this wry and fearless novel featuring the unforgettable voice of Vero, a young woman with a sharp sense of humour and a splendid eye for the absurd -- Elizabeth McKenzie, author of The Dog of the North What a fresh, vivid and unpredictable voice, bursting with life, I loved it. Finally something that's not like everything else. -- Karl Geary, author of Montpelier Parade This bittersweet work of autofiction charts Verika's journey through her neurotic childhood to womanhood and her attempts - literal and metaphorical - to escape her family and their influence. Smart, funny ... a sharply tender portrait of a young woman's becoming * Marie Claire, Best Books of 2023 * If Sheila Heti was Italian and wrote a modern Franny & Zooey, it would approximate how powerful and magnificent Veronica Raimo's novel Lost on Me is. * Largehearted Boy * Infused with a hilarious dry wit wrung from a wry attitude to life, Lost On Me stands out as a brilliant and inventive modern novel in English thanks to an outstanding translation for which Leah Janeczko deserves much credit * New European, Best Books of 2023 * If you enjoy Deborah Levy or Natalia Ginzburg, then you'll appreciate the writing of Italian author and translator, Veronica Raimo. Deeply original and with kudos from Naoise Dolan and Katherine Heiny, this bildungsroman follows Vero, a 15-year-old girl, writer and compulsive liar as she plots various bids for freedom, all of which are thwarted by her savvy mother. The film rights have been snapped up by Fandango, so look out for news of a future movie * Rushh.com * A brilliant example of the best in translated fiction: Leah Janeczko maintains the book's innate ambiguity and swerving nuance to produce one of the best novels in translation of recent years * New European * Absolutely fantastic. I'm often at a loss for what to say or how to even describe a book that envelops one as totally as this one did. -- Catherine Lacey, author of Biography of XMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Little, Brown Book Group
Product notice
Trade binding
Dimensions
Height: 224 mm
Width: 148 mm
Thickness: 25 mm
Weight
346 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-349-01766-2 (9780349017662)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Veronica Raimo is the author of four novels, the most recent of which, Lost On Me (Niente di Vero) was shortlisted for the Premio Strega Prize and won the Strega Giovani Prize and the Viareggio Repaci Prize. She contributes cultural articles to various Italian publications, and her translations into Italian include works by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Octavia E. Butler, Ray Bradbury and Ursula K. Le Guin. She lives in Rome.