If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

If on a Winter's Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino. paperback edition. ISBN: 9780919630239.

Italo Calvinos masterpiece combines a love story and a detective story into an exhilarating allegory of reading, in which the reader of the book becomes the books central character. Based on a witty analogy between the readers desire to finish the story and the lovers desire to consummate his or her passion, If On A Winters Night A Traveller is the tale of two bemused readers whose attempts to reach the end of the same book, If On A Winters Night A Traveller by Italo Calvino, of course, are constantly and comically frustrated. In between chasing missing chapters of the book, the hapless readers tangle with an international conspiracy, a rogue translator, an elusive novelist, a disintegrating publishing house, and several oppressive governments. The result is a literary labyrinth of storylines that interrupt one another - an Arabian Nights of the postmodern age.