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Troubling Love

by Elena Ferrante

A return to Naples, and a family’s buried history

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Awards & Recognition

  • Critical praise

    Called “vivid and powerful” by Library Journal

    Library Journal calls Troubling Love “vivid and powerful.”

AlbakiReads Editorial

A return to Naples, and a family’s buried history

After her mother’s unexplained drowning, forty-five-year-old Delia leaves Rome for Naples, where strange phone calls and questions about the men in her mother’s life shape her search for answers. The investigation reaches beyond the circumstances of the death: Delia must also revisit childhood memories and her own place within a family marked by jealousy, violence, and secrecy. Naples is both her native city and the setting for this return to a complicated past. The novel brings psychological mystery together with an examination of the bond between mothers and daughters and the ways family memories can conceal as much as they reveal.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Readers interested in psychological mysteries rooted in family history.
  • Readers drawn to stories about mothers and daughters, memory, and secrecy.
  • Readers looking for fiction set in Naples and concerned with difficult family relationships.

Themes

Mothers and daughtersFamily secrets and memoryJealousy and violenceIdentity and self-discovery

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

A woman goes home to Naples after her mother's mysterious death in a "tour de force" by the New York Times-bestselling author of My Brilliant Friend (Seattle Times).

Following her mother's untimely and unexplained drowning, which was preceded by a series of strange phone calls, forty-five-year-old Delia leaves Rome and embarks on a voyage of discovery through the beguiling yet often hostile streets of her native Naples. She is searching for the truth about her family and the men in her mother's life, past and present, including an abusive husband. What she discovers will be more unsettling than she imagines, but will also reveal truths about herself, in this psychological mystery marked by "tactile, beautifully restrained prose" (Publishers Weekly) about mothers and daughters and the complicated knot of lies and emotions that binds them.

"Ferrante's polished language belies the rawness of her imagery." --The New Yorker

"With the quick-paced mystery guiding the story, Delia explores her relationship with her mother, unraveling memories and secrets repressed since childhood and coming to terms with an upbringing filled with jealousy and violence . . . Troubling Love is vivid and powerful." --Library Journal

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Customer reviews

M
AlbakiReads
Malaika Taylor

I highly recommend to for anyone looking for inner clarity

T
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Thomas DiMassa

Great service and fast service

Great shopping experience! The book arrived quickly, was well packaged, and matched the description perfectly. I would definitely shop with you again

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Olivia

Smooth.