Modjaji Books
Modjaji Books is a small, independent, feminist publishing company, that started in 2007 in Cape Town.
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Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)The year of the foreigner
by Sebastiano Modadori
Milan, 1989. Filippo Degani, a senior year high school student, is an ordinary boy: middle-class family, the boring school routine, the girls, the iron friendship with the inseparable Claudio, the best friend with whom he shares the dates with the girls and the passion for football. In the background, high school soccer tournaments and the exploits of the legendary Milan soccer team of Arrigo Sacchi, Gullit and Van Basten. The equilibrium of this very Italian glimpse on the end of the Eighties is overwhelmed by the arrival, in Filippo’s school, of Robert Horowitz, immediately renamed ‘the Stranger’ – rich, beautiful but above all mysterious: nothing is known of his past nor of the reasons that prompted the family to move from London to the outskirts of Milan. Between memorable soccer matches and night raids, the friendship with the Stranger will turn Filippo’s life like a glove, a revolution that will force him to measure the difficulty of remaining true to himself.
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Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)Friends I don’t have
by Sebastiano Modadori
Four children by three former wives, six lawyers, dozens of lovers including the Widow, the Starlet, Zita and especially the Wandered Jewess, a debt of four thousand euro and eight days to return it to a group of ‘impatient’ Romanians. So it begins the story of Julian discouragement, the last descendant of a large middle-class family, unable to stay out of trouble. The chronicle of these eight days is a trip through Tuscany, Rome and Milan in search of money; a Way of the Cross of betrayal, where friends are no longer young, no longer carefree and have no more desire to help him, closed in the cocoon of their home lives. And then the memories of his grandfather businessman standing every day at four in the morning; the grandfather who at eight had already visited the first of his mistresses, and who decides to be buried in his pajamas because he was born poor, and because he knows how uncomfortable is to sleep fully clothed.
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ALMACANDA, THE TALKING LIBRARY
A different history, where books interpret the unusual role of co-protagonists.
by Sofia Gallo
Sebastiano has no doubts: the huge volumes of his grandfather’s library are useless and boring! But one night, passing by chance near the door of the library, Sebastiano listens the books arguing... So begins a fantastic story in which each book contributes, a story about pirates, mysterious rings, and of the legendary Almacanda, the lost library. It will be Sebastiano to find a worthy ending to this breathtaking adventure, after having experienced that reading minds to meet with different worlds, discoveries, and a lot of fun.
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September 2020My Grandfather Was a Monkey
by Gianumberto Accinelli
It sometimes happens when you’re 11 that you’ll go through a bit of a rough patch. And Sebastiano is no exception. Everything changes, though, when he discovers a cave full of weird creatures and wonderful visions. By listening to ancient stories, Sebastiano and his friends eventually understand the path that led them to what they are right here, right now.
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The Forest of Breaths
by Sebastiano Ruiz Mignone, Daniela Costa
Sibilla was very fond of her grandfather Rinaldo, who always had a special thought for her. However, the grandfather wasn’t feeling good and used to go out from the house less and less. She asked the grandfather; “Why are you short of breath?” The grandfather replied “Because I’m old.” Then, he added: “Obviously I’ve run out of stock of breaths.” Also at dinner, Sibilla’s father told the girl that the reason for Granpa’s shortage of breath was just that he was getting older. However, she was not convinced because her friend’s grandfather was old too, but he wasn’t like that. She had to fi nd a way to fi nd the ‘breath stock’ and help Grandpa. One night Sibilla dreamed of being in a wood, where someone was calling her. It was “the Breath of Sleep”. There were also many other kind of breaths. Sibilla listened to all those breaths and looked for the one lost by Grandpa, but she could not fi nd it there. So, Sibilla asked her mother if there was a place where she could ‘buy’ new breaths, talked with her teacher who was also out of breath after running up the stairs but yet she could not fi nd the right answer. And talking with Grandpa during a walk, she fi nally told him she was trying to fi nd the place where to buy a “breath stock” for him, but that she had not found it! So, one night when she was in her bed, she immediately closed her eyes and waited for sleep to come, to be able to return to that magical place where she had been once and fi nd what she was looking for. And sleep fi nally came. And the place was there. Again, she was in the Forest of Breaths, but this time Sibilla was sure she would fi nd the breath her grandfather lost. Because in dreams, sometimes, there are hidden things that only children can fi nd and discover…
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Children's & YAMay 2020Us
by Michele Cocchi
Tommaso is 16 years old, and hasn’t left the house for 18 months – in fact, he barely leaves his room. He is what psychologists refer to as hikikomori: literally “pulling inward, being confined”. One day, he suddenly abandoned basketball, school, and all his hobbies, and now spends his time watching old NBA matches and playing video games. There is one game in particular which determines the structure of his days, and has become his only means of socialisation. The game is called Us: a multiplayer game where teams of three players carry out 100 challenges per year, one each day. The team that completes the challenge first, while staying united as a group, wins. Tommaso’s avatar, whose head is a skull, is called Logan. His other team members are Rin: a girl who resembles a Japanese manga character, and Hud: a character straight out of a shooter game. These three do not know each other – according to the rules of the game, they are not allowed to discuss their private lives – but they soon become friends. Every day, Us provides them with a “historical” mission. They will fight either for the victims or for the perpetrators – for example, as part of the Colombian FARC, with the German Nazis, or in support of Mandela in South Africa. Every day, they must work out how to reach the end of the mission while surrounded by the horrors of the twentieth century. Every day, they will have someone to save and someone to kill. They will soon discover that history can be brutal, and that it’s not always possible to be the hero.
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Food & DrinkOctober 2022The Heart of Cocoa
500 Years of Chocolate History
by Napoleone Neri
The temptation par excellence, that craving that suddenly arises and we cannot fight it unless we satisfy it: the desire for chocolate. Perhaps it is because of this power that it is called the most loved food on the planet. Or perhaps it is because its cultivation, production and consumption - which has been growing strongly in the last 10 years - are spread across all continents. Napoleon Neri tells its story, starting with the plant and its fruit, from the pioneers of chocolate, to the birth of confectionery factories in the 19th century and then the great modern industries. He describes in detail the processing and transformation of cocoa beans, their beneficial properties, the sensory characteristics of the finished product, and spices everything up with a thousand anecdotes and curiosities that only those who have lived and worked in this world for so long can know.
