Non siamo più Roma!

Siamo Roma, that interesting English-language online magazine about the Eternal City, has changed its name for an interesting reason: Too many people thought it was called "Slamorama."

The new name is Rome File , and it's still an ideal guide for English-speaking travelers to Rome. I heard about the magazine through a posting on another blog about an interview with the Roman writer Massimo Mongai that turned into the blog post heard around the world. The interview is now to be found here.

© Peter Rozovsky 2007

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Massimo Mongai

Massimo Mongai comes full circle

Remember Massimo Mongai? He's the Italian writer whose lively and insightful English interview in Siamo Roma magazine came to the attention of It's a Crime! (or a mystery ... ) and from there to me. I passed the news on to my Italian correspondent Andrea Fannini, who responded: "Incredible! I know him!" He hadn't read him, though, but now, thanks to this chain of trans-Atlantic blog posts, he has -- a good thing for those of us who don't read Italian, or at least not well enough to read fiction, since Mongai has yet to be translated into English. Andrea talks about Mongai's science-fiction novel Alienati here.

"Curioso il mondo della rete e di internet, " he writes: "Curious is the world of the Web and the Internet." He tells of his acquaintance with Mongai's cultural and political activities in Rome's Garbatella neighborhood, where they both live, and he relates the exciting tale of how a blog finally got him to read a book by his writer-neighbor. And, he says, "It won't be the only one, because Mongai is very, very good."

The book concerns a space gypsy who tries to organize a meeting of creatures from everywhere: "The incredible thing is that (Mongai) makes riveting and not at all boring a novel whose narrative thread centers on the organization of a convention. Thanks to inventions and original creatures who populate this spaceship. To cliff-hangers ... to the antithesis between seriousness and nonsense that pervades the novel."

Sounds like fun.

© Peter Rozovsky 2006

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Massimo Mongai

Rome, city of crime

It's a Crime! (or a mystery...) posts a notice of this lively interview with the Roman writer Massimo Mongai. The discussion includes entertaining thoughts on, among other subjects, why Rome is a good place to write a crime novel ("it has double the number of embassies of any other city") and the city's neighborhoods ("Trastevere, which is full of freaks, American tourists and Italian snobs").

Mongai won a award for his science fiction novel Memorie di un cuoco d'astronave (Memoirs of a Spaceship Cook), according to the article. He has just published a crime novel, La memoria di Ras Tafari Diredawa, and he has this to say about his fellow citizens: "And remember, in Italy dramatic situations are always dramatic but never serious." With an attitude like that, you know this guy will be fun to read, even more so when I can read him. His work has yet to be translated into English.

© Peter Rozovsky 2006