✒️ My Thoughts

As a fantasy reader and writer, I know well how this genre serves as the perfect mirror to recount reality through the metaphor of myth. However, Antonio Sorrentino’s debut, “L’essere puro: il risveglio”, manages to do something more: it takes the classic tropes of urban fantasy and strips them of all rhetoric to lay bare human psychology and vulnerability.

A protagonist who breaks the mould

The author’s choice to give the protagonist his own name and entrust him with a first-person narrative creates an intimate and immediate bond. Antonio is not the unflinching action hero the genre has accustomed us to; he is an introverted biology student, caught between supernatural dynamics and the weight of an immense legacy: being the last “Pure Being” (to find out why, you will have to read the book 😉).

Set in a dark and magnetic Naples, where the clash between creatures of the night serves to redefine the world’s balance, the true core of the novel is not physical battles, but inner ones. Antonio’s blood has a unique power: it awakens the emotions and souls of the vampires who taste it, even driving them to betray their leader to side with him. It is proof that purity and sensitivity can disarm even the deepest darkness.

The cry of those who must always “hold up the world”

The beating heart of the book condenses into passages of devastating emotional power, where the protagonist gives voice to a loneliness that anyone with strong empathy has felt firsthand:

In these lines lies the authentic outburst of someone who is constantly mistaken for strong just because they are willing to listen—someone who shoulders the tragedies of others while the world forgets to ask them, “how are you?”. Sorrentino touches a raw nerve of the human condition: the paradox of being a reference point for others, yet profoundly alone in times of need.

Beyond fantasy: a moral victory

The plot management also deviates from predictable paths. The way the final conflict is handled, without Antonio having to deny his peaceful nature, is a coherent and beautiful narrative choice. The Pure Being does not corrupt himself to win; his victory is purely moral, achieved through the ability to change those around him simply by being who he is.

💡 Why it’s on my shelf

“L’essere puro: il risveglio” uses the backdrop of werewolves, witches, and vampires to build a true rite of passage on managing one’s own sensitivity. It is a read I recommend not only to fantasy lovers looking for something alternative and far from cliché, but to anyone who has ever felt the burden of having to be strong for everyone. An intense, symbolic, and deeply human novel.

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