Massimo Carlotto

Massimo Carlotto is an Italian writer, playwright, and actor. He is one of Italy’s most popular authors and the key representative of the Mediterranean Noir novel. His books have been translated for Europe and America.

For many years Carlotto was at the center of one of the most controversial legal cases in Italian history. In 1976, as a student at 19, Massimo was a member of a militant leftwing organization Lotta Continua.

Once he, hearing screams, came upon the victim, 25-year-old Margherita Magallo, killed with 59 stab wounds. He found her bleeding and dying inside the closet. Instead of reporting to the police, he panicked and fled.

He first went into hiding in the French underworld and then went to Mexico, embroiled in a bloody class conflict. Betrayed by a Mexican lawyer, he returned to Italy in 1985 and spent six years in prison, during which time the “Carlotto case” became Italy’s most famous legal fiasco.

Carlotto was finally freed with a presidential pardon in 1993. Subsequently, his case helped bring about significant changes to the Italian criminal code to ensure that similar judicial travesties would never happen again.

The Fugitive (1995) is the first book that Carlotto wrote out of prison. It tells his story with verve and humor. In 2003, the book was adapted into a film directed by Andrea Manni and starring Daniele Liotti as Carlotto.

Massimo Carlotto has had a successful writing career and has won many literary awards. He writes novels and short stories of crime fiction, noir, hardboiled, and thriller.

His most famous character is the Alligator, alias Marco Buratti, an entirely original private detective. The first of his Alligator series, which numbers ten novels, was published in 1995 and translated into English.

In addition to the many titles in his extremely demanded Alligator series, he is also the author of Death’s Dark Abyss, Poisonville, Bandit Love, and At the End of a Dull Day.

In 1998 he published Le irregolari, an autobiographical investigative novel about the Argentine civil war and the repression of the seventies during the so-called dirty war.

In 2001 he released Arrivederci, amore ciao (adapted into the movie The Goodbye Kiss by Michele Soavi, 2005). The book was the finalist of the Edgar Allan Poe Awards.

Now Massimo Carlotto lives with his family in Sardinia and Padua.