Venezuela and Italy, villages and prisons, forests and whore houses are the backdrops to these short stories which reflect the people and the places that have informed this wonderful writer's work. Antonio Mezzano in Umbria, the blind man who gathers village gossip in his one good hand; La Rusa who runs her Rainbow brothel in the Andes; Eladio 'the mad man' who searches with his mute son for the eagle they stubbornly believe will restore them to health; Otto, the political prisoner called Proff who shares his cell with a killer; tiny Silvio the poet on Buona Vita Street; Nanzia, the family cook whose heart was chopped like parsley on marble when love came her way. In many senses, these are the dispossessed, the southpaws - prostitutes, peasants, shopkeepers, mothers among them.
- ISBN10 1860498000
- ISBN13 9781860498008
- Publish Date 1 June 2000 (first published 3 June 1999)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 12 April 2014
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Little, Brown Book Group
- Imprint Virago Press Ltd
- Format Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
- Pages 176
- Language English