- Hardcover: 246 pages
- Publisher: Headline Review (5 Aug 2002)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0755311248
- ISBN-13: 978-0755311248
- Product Dimensions: 21.6 x 13.7 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 481,273 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
There is so much fine writing available today in the field of travel writing that readers are almost spoiled for choice. But with Theresa Maggio's The Stone Boudoir, we are presented with something that is rich and evocative indeed. This luminescent account of the undiscovered hill towns and villages of Sicily has all the idiosyncratic charm of Francis Mayes' Under the Tuscan Sun, with which it shares similarly subtle and allusive prose.
Theresa Maggio had long been in thrall to her family's stories of their Sicilian homeland, and took the decision to return to their ancestral village of Santa Margherita Belice. As she began to explore the fast vanishing world her family had left behind, she found herself, unexpectedly, in the middle of a life-changing experience. For her, the odyssey became not just a journey to a beautiful island, but a fundamental search to reveal secrets of her family origins. Maggio travelled to some of the most secluded and isolated villages in the shadow of Mount Etna. Many of these villages lay in ruins after the massive earthquake of 1968, and time had stood still. She encountered an ancient way of life almost untouched by modern society, where religious processions took over the villages for days on end, and where almonds were allowed to grow like weeds by the roadside.
We turn to books such as this to transport us into regions that we may never see for ourselves, and after reading The Stone Boudoir, we may feel that we have experienced the hidden villages of Sicily quite as intensely as if we had been there ourselves. --Barry Forshaw
Product Description
Fascinated by her family's stories of their Sicilian homeland, Theresa Maggio decided to return to her ancestral village of Santa Margherita Belice and to explore the vanishing world they had left behind. She travelled to some of the most obscure and isolated villages in the shadows of Mount Etna, many of which had been all but destroyed by a hugh earthquake in 1968. There she found an ancient way of life, where religious processions can consume villagers for days on end and where almonds grow like weeds by the roadside. This book is not just an account of a beautiful island, but a search to discover one's own origins.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Theresa recounts her quest to discover the hidden villages of Sicily. It'smuch more engaging than a lot of these 'we gave up the city life to lead acharmed life in a beautiful countryside with a huge bank balance tosupport us' kind of books. Unfortunately she reveals too often that shevisited these villages as a journalist, and so it doesn't seem so naturalsomehow.
It has some lovely stories in it; it's not really written togive to you a visual picture of the towns she talks of, more of acollection of stories of the people.
The book does tend to suffer froma lack of structure and dots around fairly randomly until the lastpage.
All that said, it's an easy book to read, and a lot better than the normaltravel writing pulp; it doesn't, unfortunately, reach the heights of aclassic.
It has some lovely stories in it; it's not really written togive to you a visual picture of the towns she talks of, more of acollection of stories of the people.
The book does tend to suffer froma lack of structure and dots around fairly randomly until the lastpage.
All that said, it's an easy book to read, and a lot better than the normaltravel writing pulp; it doesn't, unfortunately, reach the heights of aclassic.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I didn't want this book to end. I lived in Sicily for five years and am planning to return for ever one day. The author's words made me weep. She has lived with the mountain folk and their ways, her descriptions of the scenery and her feelings are so clear. Sicily is a land of paradox - read this book and discover a land you will want to visit and explore, and perhaps fall in love with, like I have.
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Having visited recently, this book evoked many wonderful memories of the island. Not the greatest piece of literature in the world but I would recommend to anyone visiting Sicily. Take it with you and read the relevant section the evening before. It'll help your understanding of the island's fascinating culture. I will certainly take it with me next time I go.
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