A memorable portrait of the volcanic city from an American writer who has lost his heart to the place and to a mysterious Neapolitan woman. Weaving the intrigue of a romance with the haunting evocation of a legendary metropolis, Dan Hofstadter brilliantly reveals Naples to us. He is our guide to its decaying architectural beauty - the falling palace of his dreams - and the theatre of the city´s everyday life; to the ancient festivals that regularly overtake the jumbled streets; the conversations in dialect that start in the cafes and continue into the night; the countless curio shops where treasures mingle with kitsch. And he brings to life on the page his Neapolitan friends, people whose gestures and superstitions seem as old as Vesuvius: chief among them, Benedetta, the object of his fascination and affections, and, like her home city, at once inviting and unfathomable. Hofstadter´s Naples is an amalgam of equivocal beauty, betrayals and secrets, a wounded city whose commonplace wonders are superbly conjured by this rich and lyrical book.