(Reviewed by JD Jung)
#CommissionsEarned
“I look at you and tears run down my face, yet I feel nothing, no grief, no sadness, I can’t feel at all. Is it true, is it actually true, is my love really intense and concentrated?”
A fifty-year-old unnamed successful novelist writes to her Italian husband who is dying of pancreatic cancer. She is trying to make sense of it all through her words to him. This man has always accepted her for who she is, flaws and all. How will she manage without him? How will she proceed with her life?
She struggles with not being able to discuss death with him, as he has chosen that the doctors not tell him the true prognosis. This doesn’t make sense to her as she has always sought to write the truth, even in her novels. She has also tried to apply this tenet to her relationships and her entire life.
You would think that this would be a depressing and grim story, but surprisingly it is not. She reexamines her life in conjunction with his, which takes us to cities such as Oslo, Milan, and Guadalajara. Ti Amo is based on the author’s own story living alongside her dying husband. That, and our narrator’s contradictory thoughts and feelings are what I feel makes this novel so very real.
Ti Amo is a quick, but beautiful read. It will appeal to those who appreciate heartfelt stories, that don’t fall into melodrama.
