About the Author

Elena Ferrante is the author of The Days of Abandonment (Europa, 2005), Troubling Love (Europa, 2006), The Lost Daughter (Europa, 2008), and the four novels known as the Neapolitan Quartet (My Brilliant Friend, The Story of a New Name, Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay, and The Story of the Lost Child) which were published by Europa Editions between 2012 and 2015. My Brilliant Friend, the HBO series directed by Saverio Costanzo, premiered in 2018. Ferrante is also the author of Frantumaglia: A Writer’s Journey (Europa, 2016), a children’s picture book illustrated by Mara Cerri, The Beach at Night (Europa, 2016), and a collection of personal essays illustrated by Andrea Ucini entitled Incidental Inventions (Europa, 2019). The Lost Daughter was made into a feature film directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal and starring Olivia Colman. Her most recent novel is The Lying Life of Adults (Europa, 2020). In the Margins, a collection of original essays on reading and writing, was published by Europa in 2022. 


Ann Goldstein is one of the most accomplished translators from the Italian working today. Best known for her translations of Elena Ferrante’s oeuvre, she has also brought to Anglo-Saxon readers novels by Primo Levi, Pierpaolo Pasolini, Alessandro Baricco and other classic and contemporary Italian writers.

Reviews

"A small delight, another lovely and brutal glimpse of female subtext, of the complicated bonds between mothers and daughters in a cruel and indifferent world."
*New York Times*

"The Italian novelist Elena Ferrante’s first children’s book, translated beautifully and uncompromisingly by Ann Goldstein, is a dark tale with a complex girl-doll heroine and a malevolent male baddie for brave little readers."
*The Times*

"A surreal and brilliant children’s book, beautifully illustrated by Mara Cerri."
*Ruth Scurr, The TLS (Books of the Year 2016)*

"A haunting little tale about a lost doll."
*Evening Standard*