Drawing on a wealth of contemporary diaries and other first-hand accounts by the protagonists of the events, and interspersing them with his own penetrating remarks, best-selling author Tim Parks retraces the journey of the “Mille” through the ragged landscape of Sicily under the blazing summer heat, bringing back to life an entire world in all its intricate complexity. Along the way he revisits old controversies and provides answers to many unresolved questions – as well as offering a vivid commentary on the Italy of today.

Frank’s reclusive existence in a leafy part of London is shattered when he is summoned to Milan for the funeral of an old friend. Preoccupied by this sudden intrusion of his past, he flies, oblivious, into the epicentre of a crisis he has barely registered on the news.

It is spring, his luxury hotel offers every imaginable comfort; perhaps he will be able to weather the situation and return home unscathed? What Frank doesn’t know is that he’s about to make a discovery that will change his heart and his mind.

The arresting new novel from Booker Prize-shortlisted Tim Parks, Hotel Milano is a universal story from a unique moment in recent history: a book about the kindness of strangers, and about a complicated man who, faced with the possibility of saving a life, must also take stock of his own.

Praise for In Extremis:

‘Parks’s prose brings us closer to the pressures and rhythms of a lived life than the work of any other contemporary writer I can think of’
Mike McCormack, New Statesman Books of the Year

‘Head and shoulders above so many of the books turned out by similar writers… A wonderfully written novel’
Kirsty Gunn, Guardian

‘Tim Parks is a hugely talented writer’
Sunday Times

In the summer of 1849, Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italy’s legendary revolutionary hero, fled Rome and led 4,000 of his men hundreds of miles through Umbria and Tuscany, then across the Apennines, Italy’s mountainous spine, toward the refuge of the Venetian Republic. After thirty-two exhausting days of skirmishes and adventures, only 250 survivors reached the Adriatic coast.

This hair-raising journey is brought vividly to life by bestselling author Tim Parks, who in the blazing summer of 2019, followed in Garibaldi’s footsteps. A fascinating portrait of Italy past and present, The Hero’s Way is a celebration of determination, creativity and desperate courage.

When Valeria travels from hot, dusty Basilicata to begin her studies in a northern university town, she has little idea of the kind of education she will find there. Italian Life is her story, and that of the students and professors around her: a story of power and corruption, influence and exclusion, and the workings of a society where your connections are everything.

Written with flair and insight, Italian Life joins Tim Parks’ bestselling books about his beloved and paradoxical adopted country. It is a gripping, entertaining, behind-the-scenes account of how Italy actually happens, and the ways it can surprise those who know it inside out.

‘A satisfyingly truthful, entertaining and provocative comedy’ Daily Telegraph

In the summer of 1849, Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italy’s legendary revolutionary hero, was finally forced to abandon his defence of Rome. He and his men had held the besieged city for three long months, but now it was clear that only surrender would prevent slaughter and destruction at the hands of a much superior French army.

Against all odds, Garibaldi was determined to turn defeat into moral victory. On the evening of 2 July, riding alongside his pregnant wife Anita, he led 4,000 hastily assembled volunteers out of the city to continue the struggle for national independence in the countryside. Hounded by both French and Austrian armies, the garibaldini marched hundreds of miles through Umbria and Tuscany, then across the Appenines, Italy’s mountainous spine, until, after thirty-two exhausting days of skirmishes and adventures, 250 survivors boarded fishing boats on the Adriatic coast in an ill-fated attempt to reach the independent Republic of Venice.

It would be ten years and much world-wandering before Garibaldi would astonish the world when his revolutionary campaign in Sicily became the catalyst to the unification of Italy. This is the lesser-known story, brought vividly to life by bestselling author Tim Parks, who in the blazing summer of 2019, together with his partner Eleonora, followed Garibaldi and Anita’s arduous journey. The Hero’s Way is a fascinating portrait of Italy past and present, and a celebration of determination, creativity, desperate courage and profound belief.

From Boccaccio and Machiavelli through to Moravia and Tabucchi, from the Stil Novo to Divisionism, across centuries of history and intellectual movements, these essays will give English readers, and lovers of the Bel Paese and its culture, the lay of the literary land of Italy.

In 1981 Tim Parks moved from England to Italy and spent the next thirty years alongside hundreds of thousands of Italians on his adopted country’s vast, various and ever-changing networks of trains.

Through memorable encounters with ordinary Italians – conductors and ticket collectors, priests and prostitutes, scholars and lovers, gypsies and immigrants – Tim Parks captures what makes Italian life distinctive. He explores how trains helped build Italy and how the railways reflect Italians’ sense of themselves from Garibaldi to Mussolini to Berlusconi and beyond.