10 - A year of books: My 2025 (English)

As the end of the year approaches, I think that the time has come to reflect on what has happened in the last 12 months. And what could be better than books?

I like to read to expand my vocabulary and at the same time to put into practice what I have learned. Reading is really a good way to enjoy the culture and the art of a country.

I have heard that each book that you read is as if you lived another life and that the stories in books can enrich our own story.

So today I will tell you about the other lives that I have lived this year. Ready?

This is the English version of the episode that I wrote and recorded in Italian to celebrate the end of the year and to look back on the books that I had read in 2025. The original episode is entitled: "10 - Un anno di libri: Il mio 2025"

Transcript

Hi and welcome to the podcast. This is the English version of the episode that I wrote and recorded in Italian to celebrate the end of the year and to look back on the books that I had read in 2025.  As I'm translating from Italian to English, I'm trying to be as authentic to what I wrote as possible, but sometimes will change things if they sound too strange in English or if I was too long-winded in the original. The original episode is “10 - Un anno di libri: Il mio 2025."

As the end of the year approaches, I think that the time has come to reflect on what has happened in the last 12 months. And what could be better than books?

I like to read to expand my vocabulary and at the same time to put into practice what I have learned. Reading is really a good way to enjoy the culture and the art of a country.

I have heard that each book that you read is as if you lived another life and that the stories in books can enrich our own story.

So today I will tell you about the other lives that I have lived this year. Ready?

Heartstopper – Volume 2 by Alice Oseman

The first book that I read this year is actually a comic book. It’s the second volume in the series Heartstopper by Alice Oseman. It’s a love story about two boys, Charlie and Nick, set in a high school in England. 

The two are very different: Nick is cool, popular and athletic. He is even a good Rubgy player. Charlie, on the other hand, isn’t popular and a some of Nick’s friends even make fun of him because he is gay. There friendship starts when they find themselves seated beside each other at school. Nick knows that Charlie is gay, but Charlie thinks that Nick is straight. 

This volume begins right after Charlie kisses Nick and Nick runs away without saying anything. Yikes!

I read the first book of the series in German when I was learning the language in Cologne, in Germany a few years ago. This time instead, I was in Bologna in January and bought a copy in Italian. It only took me two days to finish it because most of the book is composed of drawings. This is, in a way, both a positive and a negative of comics. For language learning, completing a comic is something attainable and often dialogues are high-yield for daily, real-world speak. In this case, maybe it was a bit too easy (and therefore, not as satisfying). 

But I liked the story a lot because it is so darling and sweet, and it shows healthy gay relationship that is based on a strong friendship, even if the protagonists are very young. It’s a bit idealistic, but it’s still such a beautiful story. Even us adults can learn some pearls of wisdom from the younger kids.  All that to say is that we shouldn't underestimate young adult literature. 

The London Eye Mystery by Siobhan Dowd

The next book that I read is a mystery for children or young adults written by the Irish author Siobhan Dowd. So this was a translation again from English to Italian, but I find that translated texts are often better suited to my level. They are clearer, and the words are often chosen to be more standard and more common in the language. 

I spent ten days in Bologna, and I passed hours and hours wandering through the aisles and the passageways of the bookstores in the historic center of the city.  There was one in particular in the Via dell'Indipendenza, Il Libraccio, where they sell used books. I returned there often, and I decided to look for young adult literature as the level of Italian would be more suited to my capacities and at the same time still a good challenge. 

I already knew that I liked mysteries or police novels, which are called gialli in Italian, and above all that I preferred to read them in Italian. (More fun!)

 I chose The London Eye Mystery because it's a mystery in which a young boy who is, quote, unquote, different solves the mystery. Ted and his sister must solve the mysterious disappearance of their cousin, who they see go up in the London Eye alone but not come down. He has disappeared, apparently without leaving a trace.

Here is the description in the preface: 

 “Ted is a very powerful character—a boy who is different from the others. Obsessed with weather and order, Ted wears his school uniform every day, even during the holidays, and has no friends. He can’t ‘read’ other people’s emotions from their faces and movements.”

 We go through the world in the mind of Ted. We see how he thinks, we see how he sees things, and how is his way of being, which is very caring and thoughtful. He explains to us how he has had to learn to systematically interpret others' emotions. We share in his struggles and in his triumphs. He made me reflect on the fact that being different or even, quote, unquote, strange isn't a bad thing. It can even be a strength. In the end, we see that Ted is the only one who can save his cousin before it’s too late. 

I loved the sense of escapism that I felt as I followed Ted and his sister through London. It was a pleasure to read the more than 200 pages in Italian. I had to look up so many words in the dictionary. Even just leafing through the book to write this episode, to jog my memory, I saw just how many words had been underlined and how many translations I had scribbled in the margins. I find that reading a book or even listening to an audiobook links us to the place and the moment in which we read and listened, where we were sitting, the fresh air, the smells and sounds around us.

In this cse, I would read the novel as I traveled with my father, my brother and his partner. We stayed in a rented apartment on Manly Beach, close to Sydney, Australia. This book makes me return to those pleasant moments when I was sitting beside my father, both of us reading on the patio surrounded by the sounds of nature and the sea. 

The investigations of Miss Marple by Agatha Christie

Now, I should be a bit more concise with the next books, otherwise I won't make it to the end of the episode. (Spoiler alert, I won't be much more concise.) 

So again, we have a book that is an Italian translation of a giallo, and in this case, a murder mystery chosen from the young adult section of the Libraccio di Bologna. 

I read it during the second half of my trip in February when we were in New Zealand. It is a collection of mysteries written by the one and only Agatha Christie. The protagonist is none other than Miss Marple, an elderly, quote, unquote, "spinster" who everyone underestimates, but who at the end is always right. As an aside, I looked this up and Agatha Christie did call Miss Marple a spinster. It's her own words. But perhaps today we would say an older single woman. 

This book has a more classic style of writing, as it was written over 90 years ago. It uses a past tense commonly found in literature and stories called il passato remoto, which translates literally into the remote past. I hadn't studied it before. While it seemed a bit weird to me at first, I managed to decipher it and get used to it after a few pages, as it seems more or less equivalent to le passé simple in French, which also seems to be used a lot in literature. 

As usual, I found the first few pages difficult, but the more I read, the more I got used to the style.It’s as though every book and every author have their own rhythm and melody and it’s simply a question of learning their song. 

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

 After having returned to Canada, and getting a flavour for Agatha Christie, I continued to read mysteries in Italian, this time Murder on the Orient Express. This is a masterpiece that has inspired so many other murder mysteries. Basically a must-read for everyone. 

I read it on my e-reader and ended up buying the English version as well to verify some of the chapters that I had read in Italian. I really wanted to solve the mystery and identify the murderer, so every detail was potentially an important clue not to be missed. 

Similarly to the previous book, I found the vocabulary quite old-fashioned, such as the hatbox, the pipe cleaner, and other objects found at the scene of the crime. I used the e-reader's translation function quite a lot. Nevertheless, it wasn't so difficult to read. Every time I read, I learn more Italian. 

There was going to be two more books, but for today I will stop here. We will talk about them in the second part. I wish you a happy new year full of reading, languages and stories. Thanks a million. Ciao!