The Thing's We Used to. Say by Natalia Ginzburg (Carcanet, £9.95 in UK)

The riddling aspect of this work is that it is described as a novel and Ginzburg herself apparently wants it to be read as such, yet it is a factual account of her family background and of growing up in Fascist Italy. She was one of five children; her Jewish father was an eccentric scientist with little money sense, while her mother's family fortune had gone in bad investments. The whole family was resolutely anti Fascist and anti Mussolini from the start, so they suffered for their convictions and Natalia's own husband died at the hands of the Nazis. After the war, she became a key figure in the new generation of Italian writers and was a close friend of Pavesc, whose personality and suicide are well described. Considering the authors reputation as a formidable intellectual. the book is surprisingly relaxed, informal and even chatty in tone. The translation is by Judith Woolf.