At the October 2023 meeting
The Eight Mountains
- Published 2016
- Fiction
- 303 pages
- Alex5
- Matt3
- Peter4
In brief
Their different paths – Bruno’s in the mountains, Pietro’s across the world – test the strength of their connection.
From the publisher
"Two young Italian boys from different backgrounds form an incredibly strong connection when Pietro's family is on vacation in the mountains of northeastern Italy where Bruno lives. Over the years, they come to find the true meaning of friendship and camaraderie, even as their divergent paths in life test the strength and meaning of their connection"--
From Wikipedia
The Eight Mountains (Italian: Le otto montagne) is a 2016 novel by the Italian writer Paolo Cognetti. It is about the friendship between a boy from Milan and a local boy in the Italian Alps, during childhood and as adults.
The book was a bestseller in Italy and received the Strega Prize in 2017. The Times wrote that it has similarities to My Father's Glory by Marcel Pagnol but is darker and more tragic. The Guardian wrote that the book's reflections sometimes are "on the brink of being overly mystical" but end up saved by "arrestingly simple language".
It was the basis for the 2022 film The Eight Mountains.