Book Review
R
For Love
by Hayley J. Egan
FOR LOVE by Cristina Neri Lake Press, January 2021
eleased in January 2021, For Love is a children’s book set in the Aeolian Islands, written and illustrated by Cristina Neri and published by Lake Press. The story begins as a child awakes in a bedroom overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea. The rich descriptions of the child’s world reflect a dreamy state as she slowly arouses, eats a peasant’s breakfast and moves slowly into the day with her father, who takes her to work on the land where the rhythm of his hoe (baboom) punctuates their philosophical conversation. “Why does the bee exist?,” asks the child. “For love,” her father responds, and the
Section Review 32 Book
child continues to explore the natural world while asking similar questions of her father, to which the answer is always the same. An emotional climax is reached when the child hurts herself falling into a prickly pear, and through her tears, asks her father, «Why do spines exist?» «For Love», he replies. Children will enjoy the lilting prose and the repetition which conveys the book’s message. «For Love!,» they will anticipate the father’s constant reply, and will recognise the simple rhythms and rituals that hold a child’s day together. Waking up, having breakfast, exploring the garden, watching the sun rise higher and higher in the sky, and
Segmento Segmento Magazine Issue XXIII XVII •March/April June-August 2021
