Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    Murder In Matera: A True Story of Passion, Family, and Forgiveness in Southern Italy
    Unavailable
    Murder In Matera: A True Story of Passion, Family, and Forgiveness in Southern Italy
    Unavailable
    Murder In Matera: A True Story of Passion, Family, and Forgiveness in Southern Italy
    Ebook302 pages5 hours

    Murder In Matera: A True Story of Passion, Family, and Forgiveness in Southern Italy

    By Helene Stapinski

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    Listen to the audiobook instead

    About this ebook

    “A murder mystery, a model of investigative reporting, a celebration of the fierce bonds that hold families together through tragedies…Murder in Matera is a gem.” — San Francisco Chronicle

    "Tantalizing" — NPR

    “A thrilling detective story… Stapinski pursues the study of her family’s criminal genealogy with unexpected emotional results.” — Library Journal

    A writer goes deep into the heart of Italy to unravel a century-old family mystery in this spellbinding memoir that blends the suspenseful twists of Making a Murderer and the emotional insight of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels.

    Since childhood, Helene Stapinski heard lurid tales about her great-great-grandmother, Vita. In Southern Italy, she was a loose woman who had murdered someone. Immigrating to America with three children, she lost one along the way. Helene’s youthful obsession with Vita deepened as she grew up, eventually propelling the journalist to Italy, where, with her own children in tow, she pursued the story, determined to set the record straight.

    Finding answers would take Helene ten years and numerous trips to Basilicata, the rural "instep" of Italy’s boot—a mountainous land rife with criminals, superstitions, old-world customs, and desperate poverty. Though false leads sent her down blind alleys, Helene’s dogged search, aided by a few lucky—even miraculous—breaks and a group of colorful local characters, led her to the truth.

    Yes, the family tales she’d heard were true: There had been a murder in Helene’s family, a killing that roiled 1870s Italy. But the identities of the killer and victim weren’t who she thought they were. In revisiting events that happened more than a century before, Helene came to another stunning realization—she wasn’t who she thought she was, either.

    Weaving Helene’s own story of discovery with the tragic tale of Vita’s life, Murder in Matera is a literary whodunit and a moving tale of self-discovery that brings into focus a long ago tragedy in a little-known region remarkable for its stunning sunny beauty and dark buried secrets.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateMay 23, 2017
    ISBN9780062438447
    Author

    Helene Stapinski

    Helene Stapinski is the nationally bestselling author of three memoirs: Five-Finger Discount, Murder in Matera, and Baby Plays Around. She writes regularly for The New York Times; her work has also appeared in The Washington Post, New York magazine, Travel & Leisure, and dozens of other publications. She teaches at New York University and lives in Brooklyn.

    Read more from Helene Stapinski

    Related to Murder In Matera

    Related ebooks

    Personal Memoirs For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      ‘The Paris Bookseller’ Honors The American Woman Who Published ‘Ulysses’

      Jan 11, 2022

      Not long after the end of World War I, American Sylvia Beach opened an English-language bookstore and lending library in Paris. “The Paris Bookseller,” Kerri Maher’s historical novel based on Beach’s remarkable life, imagines her impromptu speech to

      3 min read

    • Article

      Dreaming in Italian

      Sep 2, 2021

      Dreaming in Italian
      6 min read

    • Article

      As Her Family Home Has A Starring Role In A New Television Series Karen Lowther Shares The Fascinating Stories Behind One Of Britain’s Most Historic Houses

      Jan 27, 2020

      As Her Family Home Has A Starring Role In A New Television Series Karen Lowther Shares The Fascinating Stories Behind One Of Britain’s Most Historic Houses
      6 min read

    • Article

      Women With Wings

      Sep 24, 2019

      Women With Wings
      10 min read

    • Article

      Moving to ITALY

      Jul 1, 2021

      Moving to ITALY
      4 min read

    • Article

      Eat, Read, Travel

      Oct 19, 2021

      Eat, Read, Travel
      3 min read

    • Article

      Rina Sawayama

      Oct 15, 2021

      Rina Sawayama
      3 min read

    • Article

      Hatching The Impossible

      May 17, 2021

      Hatching The Impossible
      13 min read

    • Article

      ‘In the Country of Women’: Featured Nonfiction from Susan Straight

      Nov 19, 2019

      In our latest edition of featured nonfiction, we present an excerpt from National Book Award finalist Susan Straight’s new novel, In the Country of Women, out now from Catapult. The post ‘In the Country of Women’: Featured Nonfiction from Susan Strai

      8 min read

    • Article

      Refusenik

      Jan 1, 2021

      I was promised a girl held her glossy image, shatterable, ice skating on a Soviet pond. I’d never seen snow but for the cut out paper flakes hung in school hallways. I only knew rain as intermittent confusion. Los Angeles in the ’80s. We set fire to

      7 min read

    • Article

      Memories Of A Miracle

      Dec 1, 2023

      Memories Of A Miracle
      8 min read

    • Article

      Searching For Tommy And Rosie

      Mar 1, 2022

      Searching For Tommy And Rosie
      22 min read

    • Article

      The Last Friend on Earth

      May 4, 2023

      It was as if Doreen Saunders had been waiting for me, passing the time until my arrival. She might as well have been sitting in a rocking chair, knitting needles clicking, jam tarts cooling on the side, the door wide open, waiting for the next visito

      6 min read

    • Article

      Lockdown Stories

      Nov 13, 2020

      Lockdown Stories
      6 min read

    • Article

      Like Ripe Fruit

      Nov 5, 2020

      Like Ripe Fruit
      7 min read

    • Article

      In America

      Aug 8, 2019

      In America
      11 min read

    • Article

      The Living Days

      Nov 4, 2019

      The Living Days
      9 min read

    • Article

      The Glove

      Mar 4, 2024

      The Glove
      8 min read

    • Article

      Ghost Girl, Banana

      Aug 21, 2023

      By the time I was 25, there were only two things I remembered about Mumma. The first was that she smelled of watermelons, the second was that we were happy. We’d taken our father’s name of course, but a name is only half a story. The other half exist

      6 min read

    • Article

      How It Was

      Jun 10, 2022

      How It Was
      3 min read

    Reviews for Murder In Matera

    3.5/5

    19 ratings1 review

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Thank you so much for choosing me as a winner in the giveaway !

      I absolutely loved this book, and loved it even more because it was not written by a historian. We could not manage without historians but sometimes their books are as dry as toast. Reading this book was like sitting on a sofa with your bestie listening to exciting and fascinating stories and mysteries.

      I am afraid I had to knock off a star because I hate it when authors make true stories sound like novels. If you don't know something for a fact or have a photo, letter or diary, I don't like when they add all their own dialogue or make references to 'her thin hands', ' thin knotty hair ', etc. I like history that is light and easy to read as this one was, but could do without all the assumption and writing paragraphs based on how you think the person thought, spoke, wrote or acted without any proof.

      That is my own pet peeve - others may or may not agree with me.
      Other than that this book was a gem and I highly recommend it especially for those with an interest in the horrors experienced by many immigrants.