There’s No Turning Back

Discover the boundary-breaking (LitHub) debut novel by the beloved feminist author of the brilliant (The Wall Street Journal) Forbidden Notebook and the courageous (The Washington Post) Her Side of the Story that was so subversive, it was banned by the Italian Fascist regime when it was first published in 1938.

A coming-of-age novel that is as relevant today as it was nearly ninety years ago, Theres No Turning Back centers on eight women with radically different backgrounds who attend the same college in Rome. Some are there to study, others to escape a scandal, or keep a secret, and during their time there, they experience the challenges of love, work, and emancipation.

Considered experimental and revolutionary at the time, this novel established Alba de Cspedes as one of Italys most cosmopolitan, incendiary, insightful, and overlooked writers (Jhumpa Lahiri, Pulitzer Prize winner). Translated by Ann Goldstein, Theres No Turning Back demonstrates why de Cspedes deserves an important place in the canon of womens literature (Chicago Review of Books).