Giulia Caminito’s The Bitter Water of the Lake is a claustrophobic novel. Gaia, its narrator, begins life in a house that measures five metres by four. Her mother, Antonia, clears the courtyard of syringes, battles Rome’s obstructive housing authorities and makes an off-the-books deal for a flat in a lakeside town. Here the family has more room, but money is scarce and eviction an ongoing threat. The stress makes Antonia tyrannical. She insists that Gaia has a duty to support their family and that her preferences do not matter. 

Gaia takes pains to be her mother’s opposite, resisting emotional ties and secretly trying to be a ‘bad woman’. When a childhood friend commits suicide, Gaia tells us she is unaffected; inside, she says, she contains only ‘rocks’. But her actions belie her words. She resorts to violence, motivated by