Paolo Cognetti - The Eight Mountains

12. Is it fitting that the novel closes with Bruno’s death? Did you expect this? What was the lie that Pietro told Lara? How does he view the mountains now?

1. “As an adult, a place that you loved as a young boy might appear entirely different to you, and turn out to be a disappointment; or it might remind you of what you once were but no longer are, becoming a cause for great sadness” (p. 92). Try remembering a place you knew as a child and later returned to as an adult. Do you agree with Pietro’s statement?

2. Pietro views the act of building the house on the land left by his father as a second chance to renew his “interrupted friendship” with Bruno (p. 109). What are some “second chances” you’ve come across in your life?

3. Pietro observes his mother’s knack for maintaining relationships and writes, “I wondered if you learn and develop such a talent, or whether you have it, or not, at birth” (p. 113). What do you think?

4. “You’re the one who comes and goes. I’m the one who stays put,” Bruno says to Pietro (p. 141). Do you have a friend who “comes and goes” or “stays put”? How would you describe yourself as a friend?

Paolo Cognetti was born in 1978 in Milan. He divides his time between the city and his cabin six thousand feet up in the Italian Alps. The Eight Mountains has spent more than a year on the Italian bestseller lists and has been published in thirty-eight countries. The novel has won both Italy’s Premio Strega and the French Prix Médicis étranger.

Simon Carnell is a poet, writer, and translator. Erica Segre is a writer, translator, and fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Together they have translated the bestselling works of Carlo Rovelli, as well as fiction and poetry. They live in a village in the Fens in England with their two children, and travel between Cambridge, Italy, and Mexico, heading to where mountain landscapes prevail.

Facebook.com/AtriaBooks @AtriaBooks @AtriaBooks

Thank you for downloading this Simon & Schuster ebook. We hope you enjoyed reading it.

Get a FREE ebook when you join our mailing list. Plus, get updates on new releases, deals, recommended reads, and more from Simon & Schuster. Click below to sign up and see terms and conditions.

Already a subscriber? Provide your email again so we can register this ebook and send you more of what you like to read. You will continue to receive exclusive offers in your inbox.

This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2016 by Giulio Einaudi editore s.p.a., Torino

English language translation copyright © 2018 by Simon Carnell and Erica Segre

Originally published in Italy in 2016 by Giulio Einaudi editore s.p.a. Turin, under the title Le otto montagne

Published by agreement with MalaTesta Literary Agency, Milan

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Atria Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

First Atria International exportBooks hardcover edition March 2018

and colophon are trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Simon & Schuster Special Sales at 1-866-506-1949 or business@simonandschuster.com.

The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event. For more information, or to book an event, contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049, or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.

Interior design by Dana Sloan

Jacket design and illustration by Tyler Comrie

Author photograph by Niko Giovanni Coniglio

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Cognetti, Paolo, 1978– author. | Carnell, Simon, 1962– translator. | Segre, Erica, translator.

Title: The eight mountains : a novel / Paolo Cognetti ; translated by Simon Carnell and Erica Segre.

Other titles: Otto montagne. English

Description: First Atria Books hardcover edition. | New York : Atria Books, March 2018.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017038835 (print) | LCCN 2017048427 (ebook) | ISBN 9781501169908 (ebook) | ISBN 9781501169885 (hardback) | ISBN 9781501169892 (paperback)

Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Literary. | FICTION / Coming of Age. | FICTION / General.

Classification: LCC PQ4903.O36 (ebook) | LCC PQ4903.O36 O8813 2018 (print) |

DDC 853/.92—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017038835

ISBN 978-1-5011-6988-59288-3

ISBN 978-1-5011-6990-8 (ebook)