This is the first English-language version of an award-winning Italian novel,
The Nine Lives of Tito d'Amelia
. The book is a love story about a cat, a family, and an Italian town. Mixing fiction with fact,
Nine Lives
tells the story of the town of Amelia, Italy, throughout the 32 centuries of its history. In fact, Amelia is considered the first organized city of central Italy, four centuries older than Rome. The author, Ettore Farrattini Pojani, uses the multiple lives of a cat named Tito as the way to span the ages. (The author is the heir of the Farrattini noble family, which stretches back into Umbrian history and whose family
palazzo
is in Amelia, north of Rome.) Tito's first life occurs in pre-historic Umbria, and his ninth is in the future. Tito's mission throughout all nine of his lives is to help the town and the family to succeed. A changing cast of characters traces the Farrattini family through the centuries, with Tito joining up with a Farrattini descendant in each generation. Using his feline wiles, Tito bends humans to his will, helping them through many challenges from drought to wars to lovelorn marriages to selfish politicization of community crises. In this highly imaginative novel, the author mixes fictional lives with non-fictional information about historical figures as well as the Farrattini family and the town of Amelia. Readers are left wondering about details, such as what is fiction and what is fact. The last chapter will evoke surprise, though a clue that the surprise is coming is contained early in the book. Originally published in Italy in 2022, this first English-language version is being published by Bayou City Press in Houston, Texas, and includes additional drawings, maps, lists of characters, a listing of foreign words and special terms, and notes on sources.