A few days ago An Improbable Life was published, which is a book that my family has been looking forward to seeing in a printed form for quite some time.

Firstly, it has been written by my father in law, who finally put together the memoirs of his many travels; secondly, my wife translated it into English; thirdly, I drew the cover.
Quite the family enterprise.

Now, as a matter of fact, this is a book I would whole-heartedly recommend buying.

My father in law has had an unbelievably eventful life, and apart from the “insider’s” pleasure of reading how certain fabled events actually unfolded, the narration is indeed a mightily entertaining one.

He travelled for work (as an explorer, prospector and more) to pretty much every corner of the planet.

I remember asking him once what countries he had seen, and after some thought he told me that “maybe it’s quicker if I tell you the handful I haven’t visited”.

The stories he could tell were so many that he couldn’t squeeze them in a single book, so he divided them in several volumes, of which this is just the first one.

The book starts from his early childhood and carries on until his early twenties, before he left Rome for Australia.

I won’t be reviewing the actual book, as I would be biased and reviews are not really my thing (and this is an art blog after all!).

However, this is the perfect place to post some of the sketches I made for the cover, and the landscape used for the final layout.

 

If you want to order the book, you can find it here.

Seriously, it’s a great read.

 

by Paolo Puggioni