November 2025 Reads—Elena Ferrante and Vandana Shiva

End of the month today, here are the books I read.

1. My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

2. The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante

3. Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante

4. The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante

5. Oneness vs. the 1% by Vandana Shiva, Kartikey Shiva

Yes, I read the Neapolitan novels, all four books by Elena Ferrante. Lina and Elena gave me company, the whole month, my head was full of what Lina did, what Elena said, etc, etc.

 1. My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

"I feel no nostalgia for our childhood: it was full of violence."

The first novel follows the intense, complicated friendship between Elena Greco and Lila Cerullo as they grow up in a poor neighbourhood in postwar Naples. Amid violence, poverty, and rigid social expectations, the girls push each other intellectually and emotionally, shaping one another’s ambitions even as their paths begin to diverge. The novel explores how identity is formed through rivalry, admiration, and the constraints of class.

2. The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante

"I am not capable of loving anyone like that, all I know is how to get along with books." 

This second novel traces Elena and Lila into adolescence and early adulthood, deepening their bond and widening the divide between their life choices. While Lila endures an oppressive marriage and the suffocation of her neighbourhood, Elena pursues education as a way out, yet remains tethered to Lila’s brilliance and shadow. The novel examines autonomy, womanhood, and the painful ways friendships evolve as circumstances and desires change.

3. Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante

In the third book, Elena, now a published author, grapples with the personal and political upheavals of 1970s Italy while navigating marriage, motherhood, and her desire for independence. Lila, meanwhile, fights to escape exploitation as she works in a factory and becomes involved in labour activism. Their lives, though distant, remain intertwined as they confront questions of class, gender, and the costs of reinvention.

"I have the child, I work eight hours a day not counting overtime, people in my situation want only to sleep at night." That's Lina.

"even though I had had an education he did not want me to be capable of independent thought, he demeaned me by demeaning what I read, what interested me, what I said, and he appeared willing to love me only provided that I continually demonstrate my nothingness." That's Elena.

To self: Remind me again not to fall into this trap.

4. The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante

The final novel brings Elena and Lila’s lifelong connection to its most turbulent and emotionally charged point. Elena returns to Naples and becomes once again enmeshed in Lila’s world, even as both women face devastating personal losses and reckon with their ambitions, regrets, and aging. 

"Unlike stories, real life, when it passed, inclines toward obscurity, not clarity." (˘･_･˘)

5. Oneness vs. the 1% by Vandana Shiva & Kartikey Shiva

Guess who the villain is? Your Bill Gates. In this work, Vandana Shiva argues that corporate power, embodied most prominently by billionaire-led tech and agribusiness interests, threatens democratic systems, ecological stability, and community sovereignty. Through case studies on agriculture, technology, climate policy, and globalization, the book contrasts a worldview rooted in oneness, biodiversity, and local autonomy with one driven by profit, control, and resource extraction. It ultimately calls for resistance to corporate domination and a return to ecological and social balance.

"Like the cancer cell which does not know when to stop growing, convergences, mergers and concentration are the only logic the money machine understands. And just as the money machine, too, will destroy the planet and our societies from which it draws its support."

P.S: Totally unrelated but the broken road I drive on almost everyday (and everytime I do that I want to cry), got repaired in November. Its still not good but at least no longer raining dust. Am I supposed to be happy?