Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2000'Fans of Kate Atkinson and Andrea Ashworth will love this. Read it and weep.'MirrorThis brilliant first novel is set in the Maltese community of Tiger Bay in Cardiff where the author grew up. Dolores, the narrator tells the story of her childhood - her father, Frankie, a compulsive gambler who, due to a misunderstanding at the moment of her birth (he is convinced that his wife will finally give birth to a boy after a multitude of daughters) loses everything to his rival Joe Medora, head of the Maltese Mafia. Frankie's gambling leads to the fire which disfigures Dolores. There is a terrifyingly vivid scene as Dolores remembers watching her hand being burnt in the fire that destroys their home and the moment when Joe claims one of Frankie's daughters as his own. The author evokes the world of Dolores and her family with brilliant power and sensitivity. The novel flits between past and present as Dolores reflects on her childhood and the lives that her father created for himself and his children.

The Hiding Place

Literature & Fiction

Azzopardi, Trezza

Genre Fiction

Picador

This exceptional debut novel about family, love, and the innocence and terror of childhood has caused an absolute sensation, garnering no less than eleven leading publishers around the world. Set in a Maltese immigrant community in Cardiff, Wales, and peopled with sharp-edged, luminously drawn characters, The Hiding Place is the story of Frankie Gauci, his wife Mary, and their six daughters and about Frankie's betrayal, gambling away his family's livelihood and eventually the family itself. Written in magical language buoyed by grace, it is a mesmerizing exploration of how family, like fire, can shift suddenly from something that provides light and warmth to a dangerous conflagration, sparing no one in its path. The Gaucis' story is seen through the eyes of Dolores, the youngest daughter and, in her father's estimation, the embodiment of bad luck, condemned to bear the mark of a family that is rapidly singeing at the edges. With a lyricism that belies the horrors she so often recounts ("children burnt and children bartered: someone must be to blame"), Dolores presents an unsparing portrayal of the fear and hopelessness of childhood amid grim poverty and neglect, of children growing up without safety nets and on sunken foundations. The Hiding Place conjures the coarse sensuality of life among the docks, the smoky cafes and bars, the crumbling homes and gambling rooms of Tiger Bay. Sustained by a tightrope tension and combining the stark, youthful wisdom and the uncanny, perfect pitch of Susan Minot's Monkeys with the redemptive liveliness of the downtrodden in Angela's Ashes, The Hiding Place is a breathtaking, radiant debut.

Literary

Key Porter Books

Remember Me

Contemporary

Dolores Gauci, the youngest daughter in a family of six, watches as her father gambles away the family's money and eventually their lives.

The Hiding Place (Thorndike Press Large Print Core Series)

Short Stories & Anthologies

G.K.Hall & Co.

Determined to be no trouble to anyone, homeless septuagenarian Winnie pursues a young girl who has stolen her suitcase and wig, an endeavor that causes her to evaluate the events that culminated in her current status. By the author of The Hiding Place. 50,000 first printing.

Remember Me: A Novel

GROVE PRESS

Winterton Blue: A Novel

This exceptional novel about family, love, and the innocence and terror of childhood was one of the most applauded and auspicious debuts of the last year. Compared by reviewers to Angela's Ashes and Wuthering Heights, The Hiding Place was the only debut work to be shortlisted for England's prestigious Booker Prize -- in the company of Kazuo Ishiguro and Margaret Atwood -- and went on to become a universally praised U.S. national best-seller. Set in a Maltese immigrant community in Cardiff, Wales, and peopled with sharp-edged, luminously drawn characters, The Hiding Place is the story of Frankie Gauci, his wife, Mary, and their six daughters. With her "unusual gift for letting her characters' interior lives come forth" (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution), Azzopardi chronicles Frankie's unforgivable betrayal: gambling away his family's livelihood and eventually the family itself. The Gaucis' story is seen through the eyes of Dolores, the youngest daughter and the embodiment of bad luck in her father's estimation, condemned to bear the mark of a family that is rapidly singeing at the edges. Dolores presents an unsparing portrayal of the fear and hopelessness of childhood amid grim poverty and neglect, of children growing up without safety nets and on sunken foundations. Sustained by a tightrope tension and a stark, youthful wisdom, The Hiding Place conjures the coarse sensuality of life among the docks, the smoky cafes and bars, the crumbling homes and gambling rooms of Tiger Bay. "Astonishing and iridescent" (The Times, London), The Hiding Place is a mesmerizing exploration of how family, like fire, can shift suddenly from something that provides light and warmth to a dangerous conflagration, sparing no one in its path. "A harrowing and remarkably self-assured first novel [that] possesses all the immediacy and emotional power of a memoir...." -- Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

The Hiding Place: A Novel

The much-anticipated second novel by the Man Booker Prize finalist and national best-selling author of The Hiding Place is a harrowing, elegant, and vivid portrait of a lost life at last reclaimed. Winnie would say she's no trouble, content to let the days go by, bothering no one. Living on the edge of nowhere, she'd rather not recall the past and, at seventy-two, doesn't see much point in thinking too much about the future. But when her closed existence is shattered by a random act of violence, Winnie is catapulted out of her exile. Robbed of everything she owns, she embarks on a journey to track down her stolen belongings-but soon finds her search has become the rediscovery of a stolen life. As Winnie pieces together the fragments of her life, her once-secluded world begins to fill with people: her devoted father; the haunting figure of her mother; her domineering grandfather; and Joseph, her only love. At last Winnie understands that she has not escaped from her life at all; she has simply been circling it. Now she must come to terms with the final revelation, one so profoundly shocking that she had concealed it even from herself.

Beryl Bainbridge, Muriel Spark, and Graham Greene all come to mind, but Azzopardi’s style is all her own.”Chicago Tribune New York Times Editors’ Choice, the breathtaking third novel from Booker Prize finalist and national best-selling author Trezza Azzopardi is at once a powerful love story and an intricately plotted mystery that explores the staying power of family and memory, and the pull of unlikely but destined romance. For twenty years Lewis has been haunted by his brother’s death. Try as he might to escape this tragedy, the ghost of Wayne confronts him at every turn. When he meets Anna, a young woman who is also hauntedby her loud and carefree mother, Rita, who just so happens to be very much aliveLewis is pulled into a world of carousing, music hall turns, and cocktails as he searches for the person he believes responsible for the death of his brother. Against the backdrop of the Norfolk coast with its massive skies and relentless seas, Anna and Lewis slowly learn to trust each other and accept that an uncertain future can be as wild and alluring as the landscape they have grown to love.

Dolores Gauci, the youngest daughter in a family of six, watches as her father gambles away the family's money and eventually, their lives. A first novel. 40,000 first printing.

Atlantic Monthly Pr

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Books by Azzopardi, Trezza

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Azzopardi, Trezza. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Hiding Place

The Hiding Place

Remember Me

The Hiding Place (Thorndike Press Large Print Core Series)

Remember Me: A Novel

Winterton Blue: A Novel

The Hiding Place: A Novel

Remember Me: A Novel

Winterton Blue: A Novel

The Hiding Place