The de Boer family are tobacco growers, working on terraces in the Veneto region of northern Italy. Life is hard, and the father, Augusto, occasionally supplements their income by smuggling tobacco across the border into Austria. Sometimes he takes his daughter Jole with him, and father and daughter journey together on the perilous route over the mountains. But Augusto mysteriously never returns from one of these trips, and Jole, driven to provide for her family, inherits her father's smuggling route. Accompanied only by her horse, Sansom, she must retrace the dangerous journey through the spectacular landscape, hoping for a good trade in exchange for her tobacco, but also to discover the truth behind her father's disappearance. Written in a spare crystalline prose and filmic in scope, Soul of the Border is an epic story of revenge and salvation, a ferocious tale of violence and corruption, and a journey into the wild.

"A harrowing, suspenseful and convincing novel... something beautiful" - Daniel Woodrell, author of 'Winter's Bone'

"Soul of the Border is a beautiful novel that encapsulates nature at its toughest and most stunning, and humanity at its strongest and most uplifting... out of this world" - Cub Magazine

"Written in sparse prose over often very short chapters, the story unfolds both in action and in setting with masterful pacing and precision" - Pendora Magazine

"A timeless tale... well constructed... vividly told" - Never Imitate (blog)

"A novel in which you hear the howling of the wolf, the hoots of the owl, the tingling of insects in the meadows, you feel Nature talking and moving, in which all the passions and impulses of men are expressed . . . Mysterious, "biblical", impetuous, Matteo Righetto's novel tells all the implications of crossing a frontier. And once crossed, the reader, together with the characters, will no longer be the same." - Il Giornale

"Matteo Righetto's writing is clear and crystalline as the mountains . . . A bitter and delicate story, multifaceted as a hard stone, seductive as the land of the high Brenta Valley. A story precise like a photograph, that reflects colors and emotions, evokes scents, sounds, whims of that small far world, between peaks and springs." - Corriere del Veneto

"Absolutely gorgeous... the characters live and breathe on the page, it is utterly compelling and hugely immersive" - Liz Loves Books (blog)

"Precise and powerful writing... strikes you right at the core... beautiful writing... fantastic" - Umut Reviews (blog)