General Fiction

Pietra dolce

(Sweet Stone)

Adriano Salani Editore, May 2024, pp.240

provisional cover

In the old-fashioned little world of Val Germanasca, in Piedmont, Lisse, Lumière, Frillo and Tedesc are four miner friends who have nothing except the courage to live despite their poverty. That is until a young woman with a guitar arrives from Argentina and turns their lives upside down.

Val Germanasca. Lisse had five mothers, but he doesn’t exist as far as the Registry of Births is concerned because the woman who gave birth to him abandoned him in a field soon after he was born, on the summer solstice 1940.
Ever since he was struck by lightning, Lumière has had premonitions no one believes, even though they’re charming to listen to.
Like the other two, Frillo is a miner. He spends his days at the heart of the mountain and when he emerges he carves small statues from the same stone he quarries: talc.
Tedesc, on the other hand, is a luthier and, after spending a few years abroad, has returned to his village to make his dream come true and create the perfect hurdy-gurdy.
They fuel their incomplete lives with stories, in particular those they read in the books Lisse brings them. One day, these stories take on the voice of Alma, a young woman who arrives from South America like a mirage of freedom, and her guitar.

Adriano Salani Editore, May 2024, pp.240

  • “It’s the novel Pasolini should have written last. (…) a powerful novel, at once humble and princely, that seems to come from another world and another time.”

    Antonio D’Orrico, Corriere della Sera

  • “Valeria’s writing is committed to showing the life of the mountain community.”

    La Repubblica

  • “Tron creates very dense prose that reads and sounds like poetry.”

    Manuela Sasso, Diva e Donna

  • “Tron is above all someone you stop to listen to because she thinks outside the box […] as proved by the success of her first novel.”

    Laura Pezzino, F

Valeria Tron

Valeria Tron was born in Val Germanasca, one of Piedmont’s Occitan valleys, where she also lives for most of the year. She is a singer-songwriter, an illustrator and a woodworker. Salani published her debut novel L’equilibrio delle lucciole (The Balance of Fireflies, 2022), which has enjoyed great success with readers, booksellers and the press.

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