The Solitude of Prime Numbers - Softcover
A stunning debut novel about the intertwined destinies of two friends brought together by childhood tragedy.
A three-million-copy Italian bestseller and winner of that country’s prestigious Premio Strega award.
A prime number is inherently a solitary thing: it can only be divided by itself, or by one: it never truly fits with another. Alice and Mattia, too, move on their own axis, alone with their personal tragedies. As a child, Alice’s overbearing father drove her first to a terrible skiing accident, and then to anorexia. When she meets Mattia she recognizes a kindred, tortured spirit, and Mattia reveals to Alice his terrible secret: that as a boy he abandoned his mentally-disabled twin sister in a park to go to a party, and when he returned, she was nowhere to be found.
These two irreversible episodes mark Alice and Mattia’s lives for ever, and as they grow into adulthood their destinies seem intertwined: they are divisible only by themselves and each other. But the shadow of the lost twin haunts their relationship, until a chance sighting by Alice of a woman who could be Mattia’s sister forces a lifetime of secret emotion to the surface.
A meditation on loneliness and love, The Solitude of Prime Numbers asks, can we ever truly be whole when we’re in love with another? And when Mattia is asked to choose between human love and his professional love — of mathematics — which will make him more complete?
A three-million-copy Italian bestseller and winner of that country’s prestigious Premio Strega award.
A prime number is inherently a solitary thing: it can only be divided by itself, or by one: it never truly fits with another. Alice and Mattia, too, move on their own axis, alone with their personal tragedies. As a child, Alice’s overbearing father drove her first to a terrible skiing accident, and then to anorexia. When she meets Mattia she recognizes a kindred, tortured spirit, and Mattia reveals to Alice his terrible secret: that as a boy he abandoned his mentally-disabled twin sister in a park to go to a party, and when he returned, she was nowhere to be found.
These two irreversible episodes mark Alice and Mattia’s lives for ever, and as they grow into adulthood their destinies seem intertwined: they are divisible only by themselves and each other. But the shadow of the lost twin haunts their relationship, until a chance sighting by Alice of a woman who could be Mattia’s sister forces a lifetime of secret emotion to the surface.
A meditation on loneliness and love, The Solitude of Prime Numbers asks, can we ever truly be whole when we’re in love with another? And when Mattia is asked to choose between human love and his professional love — of mathematics — which will make him more complete?
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About the Author:
Paolo Giordano was born in Turin in 1982. He is working on a doctorate in particle physics. The Solitude of Prime Numbers is his first novel.
From AudioFile:
Luke Daniels's calm, measured narration provides balance for the intense story of two protagonists who were traumatized in their youth. Mattia, who is consumed by guilt for causing the disappearance of his developmentally disabled twin sister, cuts himself off from the world. Daniels's flat tones evoke his icy remoteness. In contrast, Daniels portrays anorexic Alice, who was crippled in an early skiing accident, with a more heated tone. Bursts of emotion convey her loneliness and self-loathing. As the two teenagers form an awkward bond, Mattia sees the two of them as "twin prime numbers," similar but separated. Daniels's dispassionate reading serves as emotional ballast for this strong story and accurately represents the heroes' fruitless attempts to connect. S.W. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine
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- PublisherPenguin Canada
- Publication date2011
- ISBN 10 0143177451
- ISBN 13 9780143177456
- BindingPaperback
- Number of pages296
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The Solitude of Prime Numbers
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Penguin Canada
(2011)
ISBN 10: 0143177451
ISBN 13: 9780143177456
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