Detective fiction is a universally popular genre; stories about the investigation of a crime by a detective are published all over the world and in hundreds of languages. Detective fiction provides more than entertainment, however; it often has a great deal to say about crime and punishment, justice and injustice, testimony and judgment. The Novel as Investigation examines a group of detective novels by three important Italian writers - Leonardo Sciascia, Dacia Maraini, and Antonio Tabucchi - whose conviction about the ethical responsibility of the writer manifests itself in their investigative fiction. Jo-Ann Cannon explores each writer's denunciation of societal ills in two complementary texts. These investigative novels shed light on pressing social ills, which are not particular to Italian society of the late twentieth century but are universal in scope: Sciascia focuses on abuses of power and the death penalty, Maraini on violence against women, Tabucchi on torture and police brutality. In addition, each of these texts self-reflexively explore the role of writing in society. Sciascia, Maraini, and Tabucchi all use their fiction to defend the power of the pen to address "il male del mondo." The Novel as Investigation will be of interest to a broad audience of readers, including those interested in Italian and comparative literature, Italian social history, and cultural studies.

Creating shockwaves when first published in Italy eight years ago, this is a historical novel based on a true account of a grisly murder in turn-of-the-century Verona. In her relentless narrative based on interviews and contemporary accounts, Maraini has brought a long-submerged story of injustice and oppression to light. The fact that Isolina became pregnant by her lieutenant lover and refused to have an abortion was published in newspapers after the murder. Also known, but not reported, was the suspicion that she was probably murdered by soldiers who, protecting their comrade's reputation, tried to abort the pregnancy. The crime could easily have been solved, but evidence was destroyed by the state in efforts to defend the image of the military. Dacia Maraini is one of the best known writers in Italy. Her previous prize-winning novel, The Silent Duchess, sold 200,000 copies in Italy and was on the bestseller list for seventy weeks.

Dacia Maraini’s Narratives of Survival: (Re)Constructed focuses on Dacia Maraini’s narrative from about 1984 to 2004 and makes substantive use of her interviews and essays. While acknowledging the importance and ongoing validity of feminist scholarship of Maraini’s work, this book seeks to take scholarship on Maraini beyond feminist readings by identifying a critical framework that cuts across gender and genre and thereby invites alternative readings. Using a method of close textual analysis, the author includes studies of men, children, animals, and imaginary characters in Maraini’s narrative, analyzes language, character, motifs, and symbols, and considers some of Maraini’s work in light of declining postmodern and emerging posthuman critical social theory. This critical framework identifies the paradigm of reconstruction as narrative center, both strategy and theme, of many of Maraini’s works from this twenty-year-period and beyond. Reconstruction here signifies the strategies by which Maraini’s deep investment in survival, which has its roots in the life threatening conditions she experienced as a small child in a WWII Japanese concentration camp, is enacted in a narrative re-building and re-constructing of personal memory, of various personal, social and political histories, of motherhood and maternal discourses, of crime stories, of postmodern fragmentation, and even of the process of erasure itself. Maraini’s narrative is deeply attentive to the mechanisms that threaten survival of the body (and not just the woman’s body); psychological and aesthetic survival; the survival in the Italian canon of a woman author’s work, memory and legacy after her death; the survival of a drug-addicted and self-destructive younger generation; and by extension, collective and ecological survival. Never marked by nihilism or despair, Maraini’s narratives offer the ethos of reconstruction as a variation on the “begin again” that marks the end of many of her novels and, as we can see in Colomba, her own aesthetic process of renewal and regeneration. This book focuses primarily on Il treno per Helsinki (1984), Isolina (1985), some of her short stories for children, La nave per Kobe: Diari giapponesi di mia madre (2001), Buio (Strega Literary Prize, 1999), and Colomba (2004).

50+ is a call to arms. It's a groundbreaking look at the revolution that's going on right now among seventy-eight million American baby boomers. From age 50+ on up, Americans are refusing to rock away their retirement. They're starting new careers, rallying for causes close to their hearts, raising grandchildren, becoming more active in their communities, and, above all else, changing the face of aging in America. Bill Novelli, CEO of AARP, knows that with the largest generation of Americans ever recorded nearing traditional retirement age, this revolution is changing the way 50+ Americans live their lives. The boomers have vast technological expertise, are actively involved in maintaining a healthy lifestyle, have been politically active throughout their lives, and are comfortable managing their own finances. They're no strangers to the gym, the voting booth, online investing sites, or the day-to-day management of their 401(k)s, and they're joining an already active and savvy group of Americans 50+ and beyond who are determined to leave their mark on the world. Novelli knows that there's strength in numbers and that 50+ Americans can seize the day by: --Working to transform health care not only by demanding quality care and lower pharmaceutical costs, but also by engaging in healthy lifestyles and preventive care --Creating a secure retirement by planning personal finances well in advance and working to make Social Security solvent for all Americans --Revolutionizing the workplace so those of us who want or need to continue working can do so in a way that benefits everyone. --Building livable communities with improved housing, transportation, and services, allowing all Americans to age in place. --Changing the marketplace by driving the development of innovative products and services that add value to 50+ lives, and using collective purchasing power to make them affordable --Advocating for causes that will really make a difference --Creating a lasting legacy so we can leave the world a better place than we found it. By discovering the possibilities that lie within all of us, we can ignite a twenty-first-century revolution to make America better and stronger. If you're 50+, Bill Novelli has a message for you: The best is yet to come.

Longlisted for the PEN Translation Prize From one of Argentina’s greatest contemporary storytellers, this collection gathers twenty-five of her most remarkable and incandescent short stories in English for the first time The Scent of Buenos Aires offers the first book-length English translation of Uhart’s work, drawing together her best vignettes of quotidian life: moments at the zoo, the hair salon, or a cacophonous homeowners association meeting. She writes in unconventional, understated syntax, constructing a delightfully specific perspective on life in South America. These stories are marked by sharp humor and wit: discreet and subtle—yet filled with eccentric and insightful characters. Uhart’s narrators pose endearing questions about their lives and environments—one asks “Bees—do you know how industrious they are?” while another inquires, “Are we perhaps going to hell in a hand basket?” “Uhart’s stories are concise and filled with both dry and conversational wit and flashes of poignant insight . . . slice-of-life writer . . . ” —Thrillist