Spotlight On: The Lost Boy of Santa Chionia by Juliet Grames
As a child, I was intensely proud of my Italian origins, as I understood them from the cultural products my wonderful grandparents bestowed upon me. It was only as I grew up and tried to read and learn more about Calabria and what it meant to be Calabrian that I realized how misunderstood and under-celebrated my grandmother’s homeland was. I became fixated on the idea of offering another perspective.
― Juliet Grames, Interview, Italics Magazine
What booksellers are saying about The Lost Boy of Santa Chionia
- Grames has given us Santa Chionia in full, all the life in this “dying” village in 1960s Calabria. Francesca, a twenty-seven year old American, leads the tour with her hopes, stubborness, smarts, and naivete, delightfully unnerving the wary locals. While we share in her revelations big and small. from a surprising bite of food, to the complicated history of the town itself, we inexorably move toward understanding the great mystery of who is The Lost Boy of Santa Chionia.
― Land Arnold, Letters Bookshop in Durham, North Carolina | BUY
- Ooooh, this is a good one! Set in an isolated Italian village, it is so rich in detail, so deep in characterization, that it’s like eating dessert in a fine restaurant where you savor each bite, letting it linger on the palette, the memory staying with you long after you finish. That is what this was for me, a book that I read slowly (very unlike me) just so I could make it last. Easily one of my favorite books of the year so far!
― Pete Mock, McIntyre’s Books in Pittsboro, North Carolina | BUY
- Another immersive novel from Juliet Grames! In Lost Boy, the author transports the reader to Southern Italy and unfurls a riveting story of young, idealistic Francesca, an American working to open a nursery school in the clifftop town of Santa Chionia. She gets pulled into the mystery of finding out who the skeleton discovered in the town is AND into the dark, ruthless politics of the secluded town. This was a real page-turner!
― Lynne Phillips, Wordsworth Books in Little Rock, Arkansas | BUY
- Multi-genre book part historical fiction, part mystery. Francesca, a young American woman, travels to a remote Italian village to start a nursery school. In the village, she finds the residents secretive and unfriendly. When a flood uncovers a body under the post office she is drawn into the mystery of finding out the identity of the corpse.
― Kathy Clemmons, Sundog Books in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida | BUY
About Juliet Grames
Juliet Grames is the best-selling author of The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna. Her essays and short fiction have appeared in Real Simple, Parade, and The Boston Globe, and she is the recipient of an Ellery Queen Award from the Mystery Writers of America. She is editorial director at Soho Press in New York.
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