Matteo della Rovere — Novelist
A novelist in New Jersey, an American citizen since 2010, with three published novels behind him — and a shelf of finished novels besides. He is now bringing that body of work into English, one book at a time, beginning with Where the Honey Was, for the readers of the country he has called home since 1980.
Facts:
- 3 published novels — 2 houses: Castelvecchi & La Lepre Edizioni
- Since 1980 in the United States · citizen since 2010
- 2 finished novels coming into English — more behind them
First into English: Where the Honey Was
A finished novel — the first of his completed books to be set in English.
Paolo Tosi is seventy-five, a retired professor of architecture in New Jersey, and his mind has begun to slip its moorings. Again and again he falls out of July 2025 and into the last week of July 1944 — into Rocca Pietrone, a village in the Italian hills, and into the life of his uncle Vittorio, a young officer of the Nembo division, with seven days left before the accident that will kill him.
At home, his wife Laura keeps the notebook. Everything he reports goes into one of two columns: what can be explained, and what cannot. The novel never tells you which column is true.
Status: Complete — English text under way · Form: A novel in 34 chapters · Setting: New Jersey, 2025 — and Italy, July 1944 · Expected: English text by the end of 2026
The novels
Maya (Castelvecchi) — A young Italian flees himself all the way to Benares. Forty-five years later, he tells the journey as it was.
Incertezze (Castelvecchi) — Rome, 1975. A young man lies bleeding in his bed and tells the story of the summer that put him there.
Amare note (La Lepre Edizioni) — A musical scherzo on Mozart and Rossini: the grave that doesn’t exist, and the genius who fell silent.
Letters, occasionally
A note when there is something to say — a finished book, a publication, a reading. Nothing weekly, nothing noisy.
To write, or to join the occasional letter, use the form on the Contact page.