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ulia
lives in Garden City, an imaginary American city located in New Jersey, |
| about an hour's
drive from New York. A river flows through it, the Marygold, and its streets are
named after flowers, which contrasts crudely with the gory nature of some of the
crimes committed in Garden City. As Berardi commented: "It is a
sort of multi-purpose set, where I was able to concentrate a human microcosmos
that provides the background setting to Julia's investigations. New York is too
large and too spread-out: if you don't live there, you risk trivializing it or
making some monumental mistake…". A similar choice was made by Ed McBain, the
writer of police thrillers who invented "87th District". The city where
Detective Steve Carella & Co goes about his daily tasks is purely
imaginary. |
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| All the same, it doesn't take much effort to visualize the
characteristics of the "Big Apple" behind the author's passionately-felt
descriptions of the various different areas of the city, some of them very
run down and full of teeming tenement buildings, others obviously affluent,
but all of them rich in a variegated range of humanity and - unfortunately -
in crimes |
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| of all kinds! Julia has a teaching appointment
at Hollyhock University, a
prestigious academic institution, well organized and governed by Chancellor W.B.
Harris. The student body reflects a very wide range of different
social classes, so that it effectively presents a significant cross-section of the
whole of today's younger generation, the kind of young people Julia
tries to relate to during her classes. The main newspaper in Garden City is the
"Sentinel", whose editor-in-chief is called Bradley. The local television station
is GTB (Garden Television), and its newsreel is hosted by a high-flying reporter,
Tina Davis. She's a smart strong-willed blonde, extremely determined and stubborn;
often she works with Julia, but neither of them ever step out of line professionally
or encroach on each other's tasks. |
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Julia's home is at 96 Tulip Street, in an elegant
residential area. It's a two-level house, spacious and comfortable, perfectly suited
to the criminologist's lifestyle. In the large first floor living room, there's a
grand piano that Julia often plays with accomplished hands. Her repertoire ranges
over a wide variety of styles, from Robert Schumann to Carol King, via the Rolling
Stones and the Beatles, right up to Bob Marley! The soundtrack of her stories is
similar to the musical accompaniment to the kind of life we all live: a glance
toward the past, a nod to the present…. Her study, on the upper floor, is crammed
with books. Not only articles and manuals on criminology, but fiction of all types;
and anthologies, biographies and photographic documents as well… A well-stocked
library that can be consulted at any time, capable of solving complex investigative
problems and satisfying the pulsions of a voracious reader. Music, books and cinema
are definitely the three fundamental passions in Julia's life!
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THE CRIMINALS |
Serial killers, madmen, kidnappers, gunmen, bombers,
dynamiters... To stop them, Julia has to «enter» into their mind! |
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