The invasion of the already topsy-turvy country – Vol.1 The arrival of the ghosts by Gioia Colli
Emilian writer Gioia Colli presents “L'invasione del paese già a soqquadro – L'arrivo dei fantasma” (The Invasion of the Country Already Upside Down – The Arrival of Ghosts), the first volume of a fantasy series characterized by caustic humor, bizarre adventures and gripping mysteries. A sparkling comedy that mixes reality and fantasy not only to tell an original and fun story, but also to make us reflect lightly on the problems of our crazy, complex and sometimes foolish society.
The invasion of the country already in disarray – The arrival of the ghosts by Gioia Colli is the first volume of a humorous fantasy series that tells the bizarre conquest of the Earth, starting with Italy, by creatures from another dimension. Camena Fiordibelli is the protagonist of the work: a decidedly singular girl, who finds herself invested with the role of interpreter between the supernatural beings invading Milan and the shocked citizens. These otherworldly creatures are ectoplasms led by the evil tyrant Lord Travius, lord of Ctonia, who has decided to terrorize and subjugate the human race, only to not be taken seriously by anyone. The author introduces the character of Camena while she is dreaming: in the middle of her dream adventure she is awakened by four ectoplasms who reveal themselves to be Celsio, Rodolfo, Otto and Serena, characters from her favorite cartoon – Giro, Volta and Coraggio. What is most striking about Camena's character is her absolute and alienating tranquility at the sight of such powerful beings because they belong to a fantasy world that she knows very well. Camena accepts the madness of what is happening because the world she has known up to that point is equally mad. And in fact many of the citizens assume bizarre behavior: "People are half crazy already, imagine in an invasion of ghosts", says the protagonist, while the rules of physics themselves waver, overwhelmed by cartoon logic; and yet, none of this manages to definitively stifle the thirst for meaning of the girl and the other characters, called to put the pieces back together in the middle of a storm. In the nonsense world created by Gioia Colli, the external Narrator in charge of presenting Camena's adventures has a firm attitude: while doing his job, he does not fail to express out of place comments on the story, and indulges in bickering with Reason, who does not accept the irrational unfolding of events. Through the story of the birth of the relationship between Camena and Lord Travius, the Narrator allows us to understand how the world of ghosts works; their strange bond is also an opportunity to reflect on human nature and its defects.
PLOT. It's about escape fantasies, but what happens when characters invented for this purpose invade the real world? Camena had never asked herself this question, but when ghosts from her favorite fantasy world invade Milan, she knows that nothing will ever be the same again. As cartoon logic breaks into real logic, the girl realizes that nothing can stop their rise and that the real question is: will her sense of danger be able to keep the joy of meeting them at bay? A sparkling and unpredictable comedy with twists, shades of mystery and substance.
Gioia Colli (Rubiera, 1991) graduated with honors in Modern Literature at the Catholic University of Milan. Her love for literature and fantasy goes hand in hand with her love for animation, to the point of pushing her to tell the extraordinary world of cartoons from a very particular point of view in “Cartoni Analisiti, saggi anarchico su stupidità, genio e inventiva”. Her first books, “Lisa ei Succhia Talento” and “Viaggio a Tetraktys: Resoconti di uno Sceleriano” are instead coming-of-age stories soaked in fantasy, a genre to which “Il segreto di Peach” also belongs, imbued with a love for video game art. “Roviglia Morr and the Tales Shop” is an anthology of his most successful short stories, while his latest book, the explosive “The Invasion of the Country Already in Disarray – Vol.1 The Arrival of Ghosts” is the beginning of a series filled with humor, action and mystery.
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Article published on 12 October 2020 - 15:46
