The Fire in the Mountain: Sicily, Etna and Her People

From the bestselling author of The Land Where Lemons Grow, a luminous account of Sicilian history, geography, culture and cuisine, as seen from the slopes of Etna

For centuries, Mount Etna has sent lava to engulf the towns and villages, terraced fields, orchards, vineyards, and citrus groves that nestle across its slopes. But still it remains home to a quarter of Sicily’s population. Why? Because Etna has always rewarded her people after every eruption with a landscape of unparalleled fertility, richness and drama.

In this extraordinary new book, Helena Attlee combines travel writing with history, mythology, geology, gastronomy and horticulture to tell a unique story of life in the shadow of Sicily’s most dangerous and alluring landmark. Venturing through lava-strewn fields and pistachio groves patrolled by armed guards; past dusky, basalt-built farmyards, and caves once used to store snow, Attlee gathers tales of the artists, writers, farmers, and scientists who have for centuries been drawn to this unpredictable landscape: from the early Roman, Arabic and Norman settlers, Romantic poets and Victorian geologists, to the local families who live and work there today. It is at once a compelling account of Sicily’s rich and varied past, and a powerful meditation on humanity’s ever-changing relationship with landscape.

Review

Helena Atlee’s acutely observed account of the Etna region is refreshingly different. This is travel writing of the quietly classical kind. Attlee tells great stories… It is the food writing, though, that brings you closest to Sicily… It is full of curiosity, personality and, above all, what the wine people call terroir -- James McConnachie ― Sunday Times

A scholar of all things Italian, and especially Sicilian, with an eye for the quirky and the poetic, Attlee does for Etna what she did for lemons: she delves deep into the history of the volcano and the relationship of its people to their unpredictable land -- Caroline Moorhead ― The Spectator

Helena Attlee’s The Fire in the Mountain is a richly evocative journey – whether on the rattling circum-Etna railway, on foot through the music-filled streets of Catania at the height of the Saint Agatha festival, at the crater to gaze in awe at the nocturnal pyrotechnics, or in the café, to reward taste buds with iced delicacies once made from the volcano’s winter snows. Atlee makes a compelling case that all of this culture, flavour and spectacle flows – like the lava – from the volcano itself -- Clive Oppenheimer

About the Author

Helena Attlee is the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Land Where Lemons Grow and Lev’s Violin. She has worked in Italy for much of her life, and it has been the inspiration for many of her books.