CT Rocks

il tortellino muore nel brodo, f.venturi, 2018


This book, recomended by  legendary Paolo Zaccagnini (involuntary mentor and precious pen pal) is a positive suprise. In a style that goes from  Monicelli's I Soliti Ignoti  to  Tarantino's Jackie Brown, Venturi gives us a gallery of ramshackle and very likeable characters and a collection of gastronomic pearls that would be the envy of a starred chef. But, above all, he builds a brilliant comedy of errors with a frenetic pace, a hilarious mystery adventure to be enjoyed in one go.

you like it darker, stephen king, 2024


“You like it darker? Fine, so do I,” writes Stephen King in the afterword to this magnificent new collection of twelve stories that delve into the darker part of life—both metaphorical and literal. King has, for half a century, been a master of the form, and these stories, about fate, mortality, luck, and the folds in reality where anything can happen, are as rich and riveting as his novels, both weighty in theme and a huge pleasure to read. King writes to feel “the exhilaration of leaving ordinary day-to-day life behind,” and in You Like It Darker, readers will feel that exhilaration too, again and again...

table for two, amor towles, 2024



This is an intimate collection of six short stories that take place in early 2000s New York, and a 1930s Hollywood-set novella that picks up where his 2011 debut, Rules of Civility, left off. The book, which was written while he was meant to be working on his fourth novel, focuses on brief but fateful encounters between strangers, would-be business partners, and estranged relatives. Most of these conversations take place at a table set for two, the perfect place to share a tête-à-tête about forgery or bootlegging or even the blackmailing of screen legend Olivia de Havilland. Table For Two is a smorgasbord of deliciously mischievous tales imbued with Towles’ signature wit and worldliness.

long island, colm toibin, 2024


In this sequel to Toibin’s acclaimed novel “Brooklyn,” Eilis and Tony are now married with two teenage children and living on suburban Long Island, surrounded by Tony’s extended family. When a man appears on their doorstep with the news that his wife is pregnant with Tony’s baby, Eilis returns to Ireland for the first time since moving to America years earlier, and discovers that her childhood love is single, prompting Eilis to reconsider the life she chose.



tHE WOMEN,  Kristin Hannah, 2024


In 1965, a nursing student follows her brother to serve during the Vietnam War and returns to a divided America. Intense and poignant, it makes us reflect on how little the world has learned from its mistakes.









Shatz’s first book is a fittingly nuanced portrait of the Caribbean-born psychiatrist, political theorist and militant whose defense of violence in the name of anticolonial liberation inspired a generation of revolutionaries and whose influence continues to reverberate today.

king:a life, j.eig, 2023



In this revelatory new portrait of the preacher and activist who shook the world, the bestselling biographer gives us an intimate view of the courageous and often emotionally troubled human being who demanded peaceful protest for his movement but was rarely at peace with himself. He casts fresh light on the King family’s origins as well as MLK’s complex relationships with his wife, father, and fellow activists. King reveals a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death. As he follows MLK from the classroom to the pulpit to the streets of Birmingham, Selma, and Memphis, Eig dramatically re-creates the journey of a man who recast American race relations and became our only modern-day founding father—as well as the nation’s most mourned martyr.

deadly game, michael caine, 2023



When Mr Zac, my wonderful Dublin friend suggested I read this book, I blindly accepted, trusting his experience and taste. And now  I truly have to thank him. Although I am very demanding about spy stories, this book  is a compelling, fast-paced novel of international intrigue and twisting suspense from a legendary actor and British icon, who now proves himself to be a first-rate thriller writer. 
To be savored with a steaming cup of tea or, better yet, a glass of peated whisky. You will let me know.

my name is barbra, b.streisand, 2023


Barbra Streisand is by any account a living legend, a woman who in a career spanning six decades has excelled in every area of entertainment. She is among the handful of EGOT winners (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony) and has one of the greatest and most recognizable voices in the history of popular music. She has been nominated for a Grammy 46 times, and with Yentl she became the first woman to write, produce, direct, and star in a major motion picture. In My Name Is Barbra, she tells her own story about her life and extraordinary career, from growing up in Brooklyn to her first star-making appearances in New York nightclubs to her breakout performance in Funny Girl on stage and winning the Oscar for that performance on film. Then came a long string of successes in every medium in the years that followed. The book is, like Barbra herself, frank, funny, opinionated, and charming. She recounts her early struggles to become an actress, eventually turning to singing to earn a living; the recording of some of her acclaimed albums; the years of effort involved in making Yentl; her direction of The Prince of Tides; her friendships with figures ranging from Marlon Brando to Madeleine Albright; her political advocacy; and the fulfillment she’s found in her marriage to James Brolin. No entertainer’s memoir has been more anticipated than Barbra Streisand’s, and this engrossing and delightful book will be eagerly welcomed by her millions of fans.








Palestine, peace not apartheid, j.carter, 2006



This Jimmy Carter's work is a challenging, provocative, and courageous book.
The general parameters of a long-term, two-state agreement are well known, the president writes. There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key UN resolutions, official American policy, and the international “road map” for peace by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians. Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel’s official pre-1967 borders must be honored. As were all previous administrations since the founding of Israel, US government leaders must be in the forefront of achieving this long-delayed goal of a just agreement that both sides can honor. To be read and learnt.                                                                              












HOLLY,STEPHEN KING,2023



All Bill Hodges fans loved Holly from the very first moment  she appeared and this book attests, without a doubt, that a fan's instincts and heart are never wrong. Holly  Gibney deserved  another great book (Mr. Mercedes, Finders Keepers and End of Watch and she later appears as a major supporting character in The Outsider and as the main character in If It Bleeds) that keeps you suspended between credible and incredible, with a narrative strength that belongs to the greats of literature of all time. The characters are ready for a film that will consecrate their fame, but which will never be able to offer the thousand nuances that King's pen generously distributes to them. King's gaze on a  very sick America (on the background of Covid and BLM) is lucid and severe, but the irony with which he blurs the line drawn between good and evil is his unmistakable touch. This book leaves us wanting more and more... 



In her heyday, Kiki de Montparnasse was a star in Paris’s bohemian quarter: a Surrealist film star, a celebrated painter and an incandescent nightclub star. But now, she’s often eclipsed by her relationship with Man Ray. This biography reminds readers of her artistic achievements in her own right — she may have been Man Ray’s muse, but that’s not all — and delves deeper into their relationship.

the wager, david grann, 2023



This is  the fifth nonfiction book by American journalist David Grann. It focuses on the Wager, a square-rigged sixth-rate Royal Navy ship, and the mutiny that took place after the ship's wreackage in 1741.Compelling and readable all in one breath. And director Martin Scorsese, in fact, has already decided to make a film out of it and it will be quite a challenge, because this book is close to perfection.

la nostra storia, g.ganelli, e.targia, 2023



The book tells the true story of the iconic  TV show through the voice of the protagonists. The wonderful choice of photographs, many of which are unpublished, must be highlighted. To be read with  happiness and a healthy sense of nostalgia!

Poverty by America, M.Desmond, 2023



In this book acclaimed sociologist Matthew Desmond examines the nature of American poverty today and the stories we tell ourselves about it. Spanning racism, social isolation, mass incarceration, the housing crisis, domestic violence, crack and opioid epidemics, welfare cuts and more, Desmond argues that poverty does not result from a lack of resources or good policy ideas. We already know how to eliminate it. The hard part is getting more of us to care.

the trackers, charles frazier, 2023




From the New York Times bestselling author of Cold Mountain and Varina, a stunning new novel that paints a vivid portrait of life in the Great Depression. And, in all likelihood, we'll see a film about it soon.


A fever in the heartland, T.Egan, 2023


In this new book, Timothy Egan traces the Klan’s expansion in the 1920s across American political and civic life. Then its leader, David C. Stephenson, committed murder...

the dark side of the moon, pink floyd, 2023

March 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the release of The Dark Side Of The Moon by Pink Floyd. Designed by Pentagram to high specifications, this official book commemorating the band and the album will be a covetable package for the legions of Floyd fans out there, new and old. This date will also see the launch of a luxury box set containing a re-release of the album together with numerous related music items. This luxurious book presents rare and unseen backstage and onstage photography of the band during the album tours of 1972 to 1975. 129 candid black-and-white photographs by Storm Thorgerson, Jill Furmanovsky, Aubrey Powell, Storm Thorgerson, and Peter Christopherson document the soundchecks, the shows, and the after shows. A review of the October 1972 Wembley gig, originally published in Melody Maker, provides insight into one of the Floyd’s most celebrated performances, and there is a complete listing of the tour dates.

travellers along the way, aminah mae safi, 2023



While Robin Hood is protecting Richard the Lionhearted's kingdom, Richard himself is involved in the mutual slaughter of Christians and Muslims in the Crusades. There, Rahma alHud escapes seige to return home and accidentally ends up forming a band of hoodlums from all sides fighting for right beyond the values of the crusades themselves. It's everything great about Robin Hood, but not Robin Hood! Espiaonage, adventure and  righteous heroism. 

The Night Travelers, Armando Lucas Correa, 2023



Separated by time but united by sacrifice, four women embark on journeys of self-discovery and find themselves to be living testaments to the power of motherly love. Get your handkerchiefs ready...

Gina Lollobrigida Fotografa, 2009



This book presents over 300 images chosen from among the most representative of her activity which - through countless journeys and extraordinary encounters - testify to the talent of this artist in representing the most disparate places, human events, historical and anthropological contexts. Passing from the southern hemisphere to the rich West, from the most remote populations of Asia to the mighty of the earth, Gina Lollobrigida reveals an affectionate and ideological-free predilection towards the humanity of the simple, the weak and the afflicted.

spare, prince harry, j.r. moehringer, 2023

 I did not expect to enjoy “Spare” but I did. Probably because it was written with the help of the talented author J.R. Moehringer, whose own memoir, “The Tender Bar,” I adored before it was even a glimmer in Ben Affleck’s eye, and who helped the tennis star Andre Agassi’s autobiography, “Open,” transcend the locker room...This book is sincere, bittersweet and easy to read, but we should always take into account the fundamental premise  to this whole story and that is "who gives a damn?"
London Belongs to Me, norman collins, 1945


It is 1938 and the prospect of war hangs over every London inhabitant. But the city doesn’t stop. Everywhere people continue to work, drink, fall in love, and struggle to get on in life. At the lodging-house at Number 10 Dulcimer Street, Kennington, the buttoned-up clerk Mr Josser returns home with the clock he has received as a retirement gift...

Agatha Christie: An Elusive Woman, Lucy Worsley, 2022


Fans will admire Worsley’s identification of real-life people, places and phrases that Christie upcycled into her fiction. They will delight in seeing photographs of the author surfing in Hawaii, or learning that her favorite drink was a glass of neat cream. (“Cream, neat” should be an acceptable order at a bar. If we work together, maybe we can make it happen.)

But the book also contains a great deal of padding — perhaps because the terrain has been so thoroughly mapped before — and an unsubtle dose of moralizing. A line in the preface sets an ominous tone, warning that Christie’s work “contains views on race and class that are unacceptable today” — a common refrain in recent biographies but totally unnecessary for readers whose knowledge of history extends more than five minutes.



camera man: buster keaton, the dawn of cinema, and the invention of the twentieth century, 
Dana Stevens, 2022

In Camera Man, film critic Dana Stevens pulls the lens out from Keaton’s life and work to look at concurrent developments in entertainment, journalism, law, technology, the political and social status of women, and the popular understanding of addiction. With erudition and sparkling humor, Stevens hopscotches among disciplines to bring us up to the present day, when Keaton’s breathtaking (and sometimes life-threatening) stunts remain more popular than ever as they circulate on the internet in the form of viral gifs. Far more than a biography or a work of film history, Camera Man is a wide-ranging meditation on modernity that paints a complex portrait of a one-of-a-kind artist.

glam! when superstars rocked the world...



This book, by Mark Paytress, has already been renamed the bible of glam rock! It is a book to read and enjoy, with hundreds of photos and quotes that will satisfy the finest palates. A treasure trove of music history,  ideas and musical suggestions.

glam! the intros!

La storia del rock, ezio guaitamacchi, new edition 2022...



Beautiful book and  wonderful journey through the cultural and lyrical history of rock. Ezio is a passionate, accurate writer with the rare ability of a true story teller . A must have.

new classics that rock!

Fairy tale, stephen king, 2022



If you want to find an even more disturbing key to classic childhood fairy tales, this is the book. Not only does King play hide and seek with his characters, but he does it even more with his readers, giving quotes and, of course, labyrinthine and exciting self-quotes.

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