LA MOSSA DEL CAVALLO / THE KNIGHT MOVE

One of Camilleri’s most intelligent, hilarious, exemplary novels, first published in 1999 and now considered a “classic.” The action takes place in 1877: Giovanni Bovara, who was born in Sicily but moved to Genoa when he was only three months old, is sent to the island as an inspector to the mills after the two who preceded him are killed. In Vigàta he gets entangled with the local potentates but he goes straight for his path, which is that of the law. He thinks in Genoese dialect, but it is precisely this that prevents him from detecting the net that is catching him. So when the priest, a womanizer and reputedly a moneylender, is killed, the only way to defend himself from the paradoxical situation in which he has found himself- that of being accused of the crime he denounced – is the horse’s move. Giovanni Bovara therefore sets out not only to speak but also to think in Sicilian, a dialect he thought he had lost, but which blossoms spontaneously from his lips and proves to be the key to understanding what has happened and above all to checkmate those who control an entire country. In short, an authentic provocation that reverses the trap made-up for him.