Marina Jarre was born in Riga, Latvia, in 1925, and lived in Italy from 1935 until her death at the age of 90 in 2016. Cultural identity, personal character, psychology, and autobiographical themes are central elements of her novels and stories.

"This singular autobiography unfurls from author Marina Jarre's native Latvia during the 1920s and 30s and expands southward to the Italian countryside. Jarre depicts an exceptionally multinational and complicated family: her elusive, handsome father, her severe, cultured mother, and her sister and Latvian grandparents"