Awarded with EtnaBooks 2019

“Fermo”, that word firmly pronounced has attracted Sebastiano Caruso’s attention. He is a fatherless 17 years boy, whose life drastically changes that same day he meets Baron Ludwig von Trier, a tall thin and pale photographer, flawlessly dressed, so different from anybody else living in Taormina.

Sebastiano’s curiosity towards him is very intense thanks also to the mysterious box the Baron always carries around. Between man and boy started a friendship. Sebastiano becomes his assistant and model, while the caring and wise maid Elena Amato turns into his friend and companion. Because of them, Ludwig learns something about love he had never been taught in the cold house he had been brought up.

Nevertheless, “wherever there is light there is also darkness”, and Ludwig will experience the darkest shadows of fascist violence and discrimination, also risking to be swallowed by them.

This novel is based on the story of the German photographer Wilhelm von Glöden (1856-1931), on the freedom of thought and art, that does not hate the differences.