Christmas is just a few, indeed very few days away. Are you in the last minute gift category? Well gifting a good book will be your salvation. Not only because choosing a book is like giving a ticket to a journey inside a story waiting to be discovered, but because you really only need a little information about the recipient and you can identify the title that best suits his or her tastes. Incurable romantics? Thriller lovers? You can choose between a great classic, especially if you are aware of its favorite author or author, or go for the newest releases with which to surprise even the most avid reader. In collaboration with Sperling & Kupfer, we decided to select for you some titles from different genres to guide you in choosing the perfect book to give as a gift.
CAN YOU REALLY LOVE SOMEONE FOR A LIFETIME?
The story between Quinn and Graham has been a dizzying rollercoaster of emotions since they first met. They met on the worst day of their lives, and they have not left each other since. Today, however, that perfect love is threatened by the myriad imperfections of their marriage. The mistakes, secrets and inevitable setbacks of life, accumulated over the years, are destroying them. And driving them apart. It is not easy to pinpoint who is most at fault. And both are good at pretending that nothing has changed. Then again, it is hard to admit that one has reached the end of the line when love is still there. We tend to believe that a marriage ends only when anger and contempt take the place of happiness. But Quinn and Graham are not angry with each other. They are simply not the same as they once were, they are struggling to recognize in each other the person they fell in love with, and their relationship is dangerously close to a point of no return. One step away from emptiness, however, the memory of who they used to be and a promise enclosed in a long-guarded box of letters could save their love, and themselves.
A FAMILY HISTORY
For the Guerrieri family, pasta was never just a pasta dish. It was an occasion to gather around the table, a childhood memory, a belief handed down from father to son; the dream of generations of men and women, employed in front of the kneading machines of that ancient mill, at the foot of the Majella, which became, in 1907, the Pastificio Guerrieri. In the Roccasinara farmhouse where they had always lived, Giordano Guerrieri had tried to pass that passion on to his three children, but Arturo, the eldest, had become a more than meticulous zoologist, while Eva had left the nest to pursue a career in Bologna. Only Diamante, an overly rebellious 27-year-old and an out-of-school student, had been employed in the pasta factory’s commissary. Giordano’s sudden death, however, will bring everyone back home, and over a plate of pasta each will have to come to terms with what the man left behind, the aftermath of an existence of lies and constant prevarication toward his wife Gemma and children. Their destiny will be intertwined with that of the young Anila, of Albanian descent, with no home or place to go, a baby in her lap that she does not want and a secret that will touch the family very closely. Until life will find a way to surprise everyone, like a tree capable of giving figs in March.
THE THEOREM OF LOVE
A doctoral student in Biology, Olive Smith believes in science, not love. She has never cared much about being in a relationship, and she certainly doesn’t care for Jeremy, a guy she has dated a couple of times in all. As it happens, however, her friend Anh likes him to death, and it is to convince the latter that Jeremy belongs to the past that Olive kisses the first boy she meets in the lab one night, pretending that he is her boyfriend. He, however, turns out to be Adam Carlsen, a sexy young professor who is known for always acting like a tyrant to everyone. Therefore, Olive is left speechless when he agrees to hold up her friend, revealing himself to be a charming and kind person. Suddenly, one fake date after another, Olive’s world is turned upside down, so much so that she is forced to put her heart under a microscope and analyze her feelings for Adam. Will she be able to understand that the love theorem follows no demonstration?
CHRISTMAS IN NEW YORK
When Ethan Greene lost his wife, he never thought he would be able to fill the void left by her, until a special woman, Vanessa, made him realize that he could be happy again. Now, on a romantic Christmas trip to New York, he has a plan to show her how much she means to him: he will propose to her with a Tiffany ring. Gary Knowles and his girlfriend, Rachel, are vacationing in New York at the most magical time of the year. The only thing missing is a gift for Rachel, since Gary forgot to buy it. So he goes to Tiffany’s on Christmas Eve and chooses a lucky charm bracelet. But, in a flash, a small mistake and an exchange of packages will change everything unpredictably… An adorable story of love under the mistletoe that will make your heart flutter, laugh and thrill.
WHEN DOES HAPPILY EVER AFTER COME?
Clumsy and head over heels, Amanda is thirty-two years old and has the strange gift of attracting weddings. There would be nothing wrong with that; in fact, her unconfessed dream is just to walk down the aisle in a white dress. The problem is that she attracts everything about weddings except the groom. Alex, in fact, her handsome, athletic, health-conscious fiancé, seems incompatible with any long-term plans. It all started a few years ago when, on her high school best friend’s wedding day, the bouquet landed right in her eye. First it was the turn of wedding dress ads: in newspapers, magazines, billboards, TV commercials, window displays, they were everywhere. Then it was the turn of the wedding march, which she heard over and over again, on the radio; it was even the ringtone on her colleague’s cell phone. When she enrolled in a pastry class and the teacher fell ill, the substitute was a wedding cake specialist. When she worked at a flower store in her college days, only orders for bridal bouquets came in. Then she got a job with a famous tour operator, and was given the honeymoon business. And so, Amanda thinks she has saved herself when she is hired at a consulting firm famous for its frenetic pace and ruthless policies. But the marriage curse will soon come back to haunt her: will this be her chance, at last, to find her happily ever after?
Articolo realizzato in collaborazione con Sperling & Kupfer