The Story of the Lost Child

In my reviews of the three previous volumes of this now completed tetralogy I vacillated between unqualified admiration and feeling melodramatically manipulated. But this fourth volume leaves no doubt in my mind that Elena Ferrante's four Neapolitan novels constitute a masterpiece. Amazingly Ferrante's stamina as a writer, far from petering out, has produced the most magnificent book yet ... and the longest! Indeed, my own stamina as a reader was tested last night /this morning, since, to my complete surprise, I read from midway at 11:00 p.m. to the end at 5:30 a.m. There was no way I was going to put the book down. For one thing there is a dramatic crescendo that demands holding fast until the subsequent diminuendo if you are to have any peace. For another there is just such beautiful writing and subtle analysis of feelings that I had definite intimations of Proust. I continue to marvel at how there can be writers like this. Obviously this final volume may derive part of its richness from acquaintance with the prequels, so you really won't want to read this until you have read the three others. Most unanswered questions from earlier are satisfyingly addressed here, and several characters are definitively enriched (in the sense of their true colors shown, since some are diminished as human beings). P.S. Oddly, Ferrante's other novels left me totally cold, even though they received critical acclaim. There's no accounting for taste, but for me the tetralogy is Ferrante coming into her (or his? -- Ferrante's identity is a bit of a mystery) own.

I got hooked on the show, and the third season left at such a cliffhanger that I couldn't wait. I devoured all four books in less than a month!! So good. I have to say the show is pretty faithful to the books, but the writing, my God!!! Every character is so rich and layered, they really jump out of the pages. The friendship between Elena and Lila is so beautiful and so real. Elena, always insecure, doubting herself, and always needing that extra nudge from Lila. And Lila, being the headstrong woman she is, never once doubting herself, always throwing her stock behind her best friend. They are like two sides of the same coin. In her casual, engaging style, Ferante takes us through the history of Italy over almost six decades, giving us a view of Italy that we seldom get. It is an incredible feat. She also gives us a look into the joys and tedium of motherhood that most don't talk about. The juxtapositon of joy and guilt when Elena gets to follow her dreams is so beautifully described. Now that I'm done, I'm going to miss these strong incredible women and strangely even Naples!

I was eagerly awaiting this conclusion to the Neapolitan quartet, and it turned out to be all that I'd hoped. Now that it's finished, I can wholeheartedly recommend the series to anyone, especially to women but also to men. Two things you should know right away. First, please don't be put off by the covers. Yes, they look like they belong on the grocery store's discount rack with lowbrow chick lit. Fortunately, the contents are nothing like that! They are excellent literary books with a lot of depth and no sentimentality or easy answers. Now that they're gaining recognition in the U.S., hopefully there will be a reissue someday soon. Second, this series is really one novel in four volumes, so if you haven't already read the first three, don't start here. You're looking for My Brilliant Friend . The quality is consistent throughout, so you'll soon know whether this is something you'd like. But Ferrante isn't resting on her laurels here; there's a lot in this book. It's about friendship, of course: Elena returns to Naples and she and Lila resume their close relationship, even raising their children together, leading to unexpected drama and tragedy. It's also about romantic relationships, and about the changes in family relationships as we age, and about loss. It's about motherhood, and since this is Ferrante, both women are far from perfect mothers (but who is perfect at being a working single mother? Elena in particular is constantly required to choose, as she's asked to travel the country promoting her books). It's about what it means to succeed in life. It's about escaping the place and the social class to which one is born, and whether that's even possible. It's about an Italy that's constantly changing - a vibrant, violent, dangerous place, steeped in history yet teeming with new ideas. As always, the book rushes along through short chapters that delve deeply into the characters' lives and interactions. The writing is urgent and electric, not quite like anything else I've read. The characters are people, in all their complexity. The author doesn't make it easy for us by assigning them two or three traits apiece; instead she shows them to us and lets us figure them out for ourselves. You may not always like them, but you'll remember them. I'm a little disappointed this series is finished, but looking forward to more from this author (and maybe even re-reading these books someday - something I hardly ever do). If you haven't yet started this series, you are in for a treat.

prachtige afronding van deze ijzersterke serie. Enkele zeer verassende wendingen en zoals steeds schitterende persoonsbeschrijvingen. Kandidaat voor een volgende Nobelprijs

I haven't read anything like this. I am uplifted yet devastated.

This book is real, pungent, satisfying like a meal. In every way it has surprised and engaged me. It has exploded the niceties of friendship into deep growling tender jealous truths. Love and hate , instinct and study, fortune and tragedy are ever moving rivers. I see this quartet of novels as a great effort of love for all people, but especially women, Elena knows female treachery she knows the brilliance and fate of women. This is a book like all the other 3 that cannot be put down. If you think my words excessive read through to book 3 .... Here is a story told in every day language that exposes the passion the madness the cruelty of a woman in love. She spares herself nothing exposing her desperation her abandonment even of her children, it tells of her incapacity to do anything other than to satisfy a childhood love that we and even she knows must finally betray her. Her knowing is a cleansing an explosion of truth, the lid is finally off female rage. So satisfying, excellent, an apostle of the female experience.

Amazing novel, the last of the four doesn’t disappear by and is even more poignant, more deep and philosophical than the first 3.

It's hard to define exactly what makes the Neapolitan Quartet such an extraordinary achievement, and such a compelling experience for the reader; now sadly at an end with the publication of the final novel in the series (though these are books that demand repeated re-reading). On the face of it an extended bildungsroman, in fact the novels constitute something much deeper and more complex. The genius of Elena Ferrante, however, is to subvert a familiar genre in an utterly naturalistic and unselfconscious way; teasing allusions to previous incidents and elusive insights into things only half-said are weaved in to the relentless narrative with such profound subtlety that suggests the real mystery about Ferrante is whether she is some kind of psychological savant, or simply one of the most skillful novelists there has ever been. Credit must presumably also go to Ann Goldstein for preserving these delicate nuances in the English translation. This, the final book in the quartet, maintains the same position; there is no grand denouement or final twist as might have been expected, and as many novelists would no doubt have employed. For Ferrante, you feel, such a conclusion would be psychologically dishonest, and so the ending is enigmatic and in some ways unsatisfying - another example of her disregarding standard literary tropes in favour of an unflinching realism. Ultimately this is a series of novels about relationship and identity, and how we construct the former in the context of the latter. The friendship between Lenu and Lina is endlessly fascinating; what is the significance of the lifelong symbiosis in which they seem to alternate between the roles of host and parasite, rarely achieving an equilibrium? As a young woman, Elena makes her name assailing the conventional oppressions of gender and class which she believes constrain her ability to forge a different identity. But she is in fact Lina's creation; and throughout their lives Lenu defines herself in relation to Lina's expectations: sometimes striving to meet them; sometimes rebelling against; sometimes able to transcend for short periods; but always returning to the roles established in childhood. Ultimately, it seems that the final, unspoken, question for Lenu is whether she can reconstruct herself in the absence of Lina. Of course, the significance of identity as a central theme is made even more intriguing by the mystery surrounding Ferrante's herself. Personally, I have no difficulty accepting her stated reasons for wishing to preserve her anonymity, and I don't think it's necessary to infer from it that the Neapolitan novels are autobiographical. If Lenu 'is' Ferrante, then the autobiographical element must be pretty loose, otherwise her identity could be easily uncovered. But if there is an element of autobiography, surely it is more likely that Ferrante is in fact Lila? After all, the sentiment "once written, books have no further need of their authors" is heard far more readily in Lila's voice than Elena's. If so,' Lila''s authorship of the novels in the assumed voice of Lenu would represent the ultimate manifestation of their enmeshed identities. But that's the joy of these books; Ferrante disdains neat explanations, so the reader is left with endless possibilities to ponder.