We love an attractive, artful book cover – so let’s take a moment to admire the jacket for Runaway Horses by the Italian authors Carlo Fruttero and Franco Lucentini. With a horse race central to the storyline, we see jockeys galloping across a terracotta scene, with some of the ancient architectural treasures of old Siena in the background. And let’s not overlook the deadly serpent in the foreground – it makes us wonder who will get bitten…
The illustration was created by David Wardle of the design studio Bold & Noble to accompany Fruttero and Lucentini’s story about Milanese author Enzo Maggione and his wife Valeria, who are visiting Siena at the time of the Palio – the city’s traditional summer horse race, which dates back to the Middle Ages. The competition is intense, there’s all kinds of skulduggery, and when one of the jockeys is killed Maggione finds himself in the middle of a mystery. On the one hand there is danger, on the other a passionate reawakening for Enzo, Valeria and other characters in the book.
While it is by the same authors as Lover of No Fixed Abode, and shares some similar themes, Runaway Horses is a translation of Fruttero and Lucentini’s crime story Il Palio delle contrade morte – ‘The Palio of the dead quarters’ – and was written three years earlier in 1983. The translation was carried out by Gregory Dowling, a UK-based American academic and author. We interviewed Gregory here when Lover of No Fixed Abode was published in English in 2024.
The typography is a nice touch as well, with hand-rendered Roman script in full caps, reminiscent of the Latin inscriptions on Trajan’s Column in Rome, which have inspired type designers throughout the ages. Another reference to the book’s ancient setting.
With its charming cover and 208-page mystery inside, Runaway Horses looks like it might be the perfect escape from this current cold weather, and all the madness that dominates the news at the moment. Could it be an interesting diversion too, for those who love the Dick Francis horse racing mysteries? Our review will be with you very soon.
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