A Crime Novel Preface by Luciano Funetta (Italian Edition)

The figure of the serial killer serves as the lens through which Simone Sauza explores fundamental philosophical and cultural issues, from the representation of violence to the darker aspects of sexuality. The central question the author poses, venturing into the minds and histories of the most notorious figures in global crime chronicles, concerns what a serial killer sees "when looking at the world we share": in this sense, as Luciano Funetta emphasizes in the preface, one could argue that "everything Sauza writes is an attempt to restore an impossible gaze. The fact that the subject holding the gaze is the serial killer may be of relative importance, because the investigative work carried out in Tutto era cenere (All was Ashes) has a broader intent."

The experience of the serial killer constitutes an extreme case of the human experience; therefore, beyond strictly criminological interpretations, the serial act of killing reveals the intimate fragility of concepts such as the self, interiority, and the world. In this book that oscillates between essay and autofiction, the words of philosophers and writers, as well as the analysis of films and web phenomena, guide the reader through a narrative and phenomenological journey that unfolds between trauma, media influence, desire, and, above all, the gaze.

Because, as Sauza writes, the serial killer "inhabits the same piece of reality as every individual, but traverses it with a gaze that comes from elsewhere," thus providing us with a different reading of what lies before our eyes.

In this sense, the work of Simone Sauza can be seen as an attempt to understand the dark and complex aspects of the human condition, using the figure of the serial killer as a prism through which to explore fundamental philosophical and cultural questions. By delving into the minds and histories of these notorious individuals, the author seeks to shed light on the fragility of our own sense of self, the influence of media and desire, and the ways in which our perception of the world can be distorted by the gaze of the "other."

Through a blend of narrative, philosophical reflection, and cultural analysis, Tutto era cenere invites the reader to confront the unsettling realities that underlie our shared existence, challenging us to consider the boundaries between normality and deviance, sanity and madness, and the ways in which the darkest aspects of the human psyche can shape our understanding of the world around us.

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