A Very Cold Winter

The rediscovered Italian classic from a forgotten feminist author

A novel of secrets and female solidarity set in post-war Milan, by one of Italys most significant women writers.

A novel of secrets and female solidarity set in post-war Milan, by one of Italys most significant women writers. Translated by Julia Nelsen.

It is 1946 and Milan is in ruins. Camilla opens her illegally occupied attic to her extended family as they rebuild their lives among the rubble. The absence of men lost to war, death, or abandonment leaves the burden of survival to the women, who use the attic to begin to imagine fragile futures: Camilla works to carry the family toward dignity and normalcy; Lalla dreams of becoming a novelist to escape their grim reality; Regina, widowed by the war, pins her hopes on her infant daughter; Alba chases independence and love. Varying political ideologies, loyalties, and wartime secrets filter t