SYNOPSIS

After an argument with his parents, Cosimo, a twelve-year-old boy from a noble Ligurian family from Ombrosa, climbs a tree in the garden of his house and from that moment decides he never wants to come down for the rest of his life. His younger brother Biagio tells the story of Cosimo’s adventures in the woods during a historical period of great changes: the eighteenth century, which will also influence the daily life of the protagonist, who will study philosophy, fight against Turkish pirates, fall in love and meet Napoleon Bonaparte without ever setting foot on land. His alternative lifestyle will soon become famous beyond the Italian borders.

REVIEW

It is a kind of improbable and bizarre story. It entertains but is a little boring. Then towards the end it arouses curiosity, because you wonder if the main character will finally decide to come down from the tree.
The author used the third-person narrator who meticulously recounts every paradoxical adventure of the protagonist, but also the first-person narrator who on certain occasions feels the need to personally expose the facts. This choice broadens the point of view of the story, avoiding boring the reader with a single vision that is already well defined from the beginning.
As for the secondary characters, the author focuses more on their behaviour than on their physical appearance, as if this were enough to visualize a person, and surprisingly it is. Their descriptions and dialogues help to imagine the bizarre individuals who appear in the different chapters and make the reading smoother, which, at certain moments, slows down due to the narration of some scenes that excessively lengthen the story.