A little lumpen novelita

'A Little Lumpen Novelita' percolates with a young writer's fierce ambitions and intensely tender love of women. 'Now I am a mother and a married woman, but not long ago I led a life of crime': so Bianca begins her tale of growing up the hard way in Rome. Orphaned overnight as a teenager - 'out parents died in a car crash on their first vacation without us' - she drops out of school, gets a crabby job, sees a terrible brightness at night, and drifts into bad company. Her little brother brings home two petty criminals who need a place to stay. As the four of them share the family apartment and plot a strange crime, Bianca learns she can drift lower.