La città di Acqua e Vetro: Steampunk Venice Deserves a Movie

The visual impact is strong from the get-go. The book sets the scene well. I’m immersed. La Citta Bassa and La Citta Alta, the low and high city in Venice, are a perfect setting for a steampunk story with some fantasy elements. Good choice. The subject here is the Italian novel La città di Acqua e Vetro by Linda Ghio.

It moves quite fast from one scene to another, and some of the world-building elements feel forced, as if they are there only to build the world. A bit like a checklist. Now we need X, okay, let’s write a scene for that and insert an infographic. That is the weak point, at least in my book. Writing that phrase, in my book, made me realize something about myself. Watching a movie, I can enjoy something simple, forced, even stupid. A Fast & Furious movie can still do the job. From a book, though, I expect a bit more. Not Dostoevsky, necessarily. Just something with a little resistance. Something that pushes back. Food for thought. So that is my own bias.

Here, La città di acqua e vetro stays close to YA in its directness without quite being YA. It says things too plainly. There is not much depth to the characters, and when the book reveals a secret about one of them halfway through, it does not leave much room for it to linger. They do not really dig into it. It does not affect the story. It is just, okay, moving on.

Without getting into spoilers, the book did send me back to a couple of books I bought in Prague a few years ago and still had not read.

All that said, I did enjoy the book. I finished it quite quickly. But the conclusion is simple: in this case, contrary to common opinion, the film might actually be better than the book.

All the way through, the setting made me think of the series Arcane, which I adore. The visual beauty is jaw-dropping, and the world-building holds up too. The story less so, especially in the second season, but it still has more depth than this book. What I am trying to get at is this: I think La città di Acqua e Vetro would work perfectly as a movie. Linda Ghio, I order you to sell the film rights immediately. I will be there at the premiere. I want to see this world in front of me.