The Neapolitan Quartet Reader

by Europa Editions

Reading Groups have made Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Quartet a long-selling bestseller. At Europa Editions we’d like to express by offering this extensive guide to the four installments of the Neapolitan series for book groups, reading groups, and book discussion leaders. With a summary of the series, discussion questions, a summary of international praise and much more, this publication should prove a helpful guide to any and all discussions about Ferrante’s masterpiece.

58 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 16, 2016

Reviews

[Jenny Noble · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series of books must be read in order; none of the novels really stands alone I feel and events in previous books are often referred to.
The quartet immerses the reader in the ’neighbourhood’ in Naples in all its fear, violence, misogyny, backwardness and struggle. The characters are alive and spitting and draw you into the story of the two friends, their ambitions, fears and interdependence. As in real life, some of the relationships are arcane but that of the two main protagonists is explored in depth with remarkable perception. Their exploits are full of drama, suspense, and demand empathy.
However, I felt a bit dissatisfied by the ending of the last book; as in real life I was left wondering what the future held and wished the ends had been tied up a bit more neatly.
Perhaps there is no ending because it is real life?

[Alison Congro · Rating 5 out of 5]

I will forever think fondly of Elena Ferrante and what she has taught me about being a woman.