Saturday November 30th at 5.30 pm the British author and journalist Tobias Jones will meet the members of the English Reading Club and all the readers of the library to discuss "Ultra" (Head of Zeus, 2019), his new book about Italy's football fans.

Free entry. 

The event will be conducted in English.

Tobias Jones is the author of three crime novels set in Italy, and four works of non-fiction including The Dark Heart of Italy and Blood on the Altar. He is an expert on both Italian crime and Italian football, with two of his Italian true-crime works having been optioned by film companies.

Ultra (Head of Zeus, 2019)

Italy's ultras are the most organised and violent fans in European football. Many groups have evolved into criminal gangs, involved in ticket-touting, drug-dealing and murder. A cross between the Hell's Angels and hooligans, they're often the foot-soldiers of the Mafia and have been instrumental in the rise of the far-right.

But the purist ultras say that they are are insurgents fighting against a police state and modern football. Only amongst the ultras, they say, can you find belonging, community and a sacred concept of sport. They champion not just their teams, they say, but their forgotten suburbs and the dispossessed.

Through the prism of the ultras, Jones crafts a compelling investigation into Italian society and its favourite sport. He writes about not just the ultras of some of Italy's biggest clubs – Juventus, Torino, Lazio, Roma and Genoa – but also about its lesser-known ones from Cosenza and Catania. He examines the sinister side of football fandom, with its violence and political extremism, but also admires the passion, wit, solidarity and style of a fascinating and contradictory subculture.