Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio (All reviews)

Nov 14 2014
Off the Shelf: "Lithe and hilarious"
Jun 9 2014
The Culture Trip: "Lakhous paints an affectionate portrait of the present day Eternal City"
Apr 21 2014
Los Angeles Public Library Book Review: "Compelling, funny and illuminating."
Apr 14 2014
The Cornell Daily Sun: "Both prospective and current students voiced their approval of the selection of Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio... for the 2014 Cornell New Student Reading Project."
Jul 6 2009
Bookstore People: "Clash is a novella packed with themes. The most obvious is racism and immigration; apparently the inability to like people different from yourself is universal."
Apr 3 2009
The Washington Times: "Recalls Naguib Mahfouz's epic about slices of Egyptian popular life in the 'The Cairo Trilogy' of the 1950s. The rich variety of characters and psychological understanding place Mr. Lakhous in the tradition of Balzac and Dickens."
Dec 28 2008
Interview with Amara Lakhous
Dec 28 2008
Mostly Fiction: "Algerian author Amara Lakhous, now an Italian resident, pens a sly satire of an immigrant’s life in Italy, using the murder of a young man in the elevator of an apartment building adjacent to Piazza Vittorio as the catalyst..."
Dec 12 2008
Detectives Beyond Borders: "the stories are heartbreaking, though the comedy predominates."
Dec 4 2008
The New Yorker: "The author’s real subject is the heave and crush of modern, polyglot Rome, and he renders the jabs of everyday speech with such precision that the novel feels exclaimed rather than written."
Nov 13 2008
Brooklyn Rail: "A satirical, enigmatic take on the racial tensions that afflict present-day Europe."
Nov 13 2008
NPR's Fresh Air: "What's memorable about Lakhous' novel is what he shows us of an often inward-looking nation confronting the teeming vibrancy of multicultural life."
Oct 28 2008
Shelf Awareness: "An Italian noir-comedy-satire, written by an Algerian, that effectively breaks rules and has a good time doing it."
Oct 27 2008
The New Yorker: "I was waiting for some friends and suddenly noticed that the man in the cap standing opposite me was Amara Lakhous, the author."
Oct 14 2008
Seattle Times: "The murder in Amara Lakhous' wonderfully offbeat novel [...] is just an excuse to let Algiers-born Lakhous portray a vibrant, multiethnic neighborhood through the voices of characters being interviewed about the death."
Oct 13 2008
Philadelphia Inquirer: "No recent Italian novel so elegantly and directly confronts the 'new Italy.'"
Sep 22 2008
Booklist: "This short but nearly flawless novel offers an intriguing and satisfying blend of crime and literary fiction."
Aug 26 2008
Publishers Weekly: "intriguing psychological and social insight alongside a playful whodunit plot, exposing the power of fear, racial prejudice and cultural misconception to rob a neighborhood of its humanity."
Mar 27 2008
Il Giornale (Italy): "[An] intelligent and irresistible blend of social satire and noir."
Mar 27 2008
Corriere della Sera (Italy): "This blessed Algerian author has managed to throw a revolutionary commonplace up in our faces. In the absence of words, in the absence of awareness, distrust, desperation, and violence are born in their place."
Mar 17 2008
Repubblica (Italy): "the real protagonist here is the piazza itself, its life made up of many lives intertwined, its chaotic vitality. Read this book, it’s well worth the time. It represents a new look at a new city."
Mar 17 2008
L'Espresso (Italy): "The pages of this book, discreetly peppered with Arabic words, Neapolitan dialect, roman slang, and proverbs from all over, burgeon with poignant nostalgia, candid naivety, and grotesque gaiety."
Mar 17 2008
Café Babel: "[This] novel presents humanity in all its shapes and sizes, with characteristic wit and irony...It ends with a revelatory take on the future of society that is universal in scope and insight."
Mar 10 2008
France 24 (video in English): Amara Lakhous and the Piazza Vittorio art scene featured on France 24