"But the oranges of Palaia Epidavros are surely the most delicious of all. Never over-firm, their skins yield to the finger-nail without the help of a knife. Your hands, your fingers manipulate with ease their tender flesh. Peeled and revealed, they release their sweet juice. Orange dessert. It is a tangerine that has grown into a fully-fledged adult. Yet it is the only daughter of the doctor of Palaia Epidavros of olden times, who never managed to grow up. It has been said - and I tend to agree, and, I think, you should too (after all, there's nothing to lose) - that only in a remote corner of Sicily can one hope to find oranges that come close to resembling those of Palaia Epidavros..."

"Julius Leroy, the great watchmaker of our town... He would be hunched over his work, crowned with a halo of light and an eye-piece stuck like a leech onto his right eye. A tick-tock pirate, the surgeon of time, delving into the clockwork with tweezers and gilded screwdrivers, with mainsprings and hairsprings, barrels and pinions, gears and wheels, the finest rubies and diamonds. He set to work on massive clocks, wall clocks, ancient grandfather clocks, that had sounded historical, fateful hours down the years..."

Whatever was indelibly inscribed on a fragile childhood, whatever played a decisive role in the formation of the mind and spirit of a narrator who consciously prefers to remain close to his emotions goes to make up the firmly crafted and frequently harsh truths that compose these (usually) four- or five-page memoirs.