Excerpt from I'm Not Scared by Niccolò Ammaniti, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

'It's not true,' said Maria. 'He's not doing them.'

'I do them now and again. Almost always.'

'Come here.' I sat on his knee too and tried to kiss him. 'Don't you kiss me, you're all dirty. If you want to kiss your father, you've got to wash first. Teresa, what shall we do, send them to bed without supper?'

Papa had a nice smile, perfect white teeth. Neither my sister nor I has inherited them.

Mama replied without even turning round.

'It'd be no more than they deserve! I can't stand any more of these two.' She really was angry.

'Let's say this. If they want to have supper and get the present I've brought them, Michele's got to beat me at arm-wrestling. Otherwise, bed with no supper.'

He'd brought us a present!

'You and your jokes . . .' Mama was too happy that papa was home again. When papa went away her stomach hurt, and the more time passed the less she talked. After a month she went completely mute.

'Michele can't beat you. It's not fair,' said my sister.

'Michele, show your sister what you can do. And keep those legs apart. If you sit crooked you'll lose straight away and there'll be no present.'

I got into position. I clenched my teeth and gripped papa's hand and started to push. Nothing. He didn't budge.

'Go on! Have you got ricotta instead of muscles? You're weaker than a gnat! Put your back into it, for God's sake!'

I murmured: 'I can't do it.'

It was like bending an iron bar.

'You're a sissy, Michele. Maria, help him, come on!'

My sister climbed on the table and together, gritting our teeth and breathing through our noses, we managed to get him to lower that arm.

'The present! Give us the present!' Maria jumped down from the table.

Papa picked up a cardboard box full of crumpled-up newspaper. Inside was the present.

'A boat!' I said.

'It's not a boat, it's a gondola,' papa explained.

'What's a gondola?'

'Gondolas are Venetian boats. And they only use one oar.'

'What's an oar?' my sister asked.

'A stick to move a boat with.'

It was really beautiful. Made of black plastic. With little silvery pieces and at the end a little figure in a red-and-white striped shirt and a straw hat.

But we discovered that we weren't allowed to handle it. It was made to be put on the television. And between the television and the gondola there would have to be a white lace doily. Like a little lake. It wasn't a toy. It was something precious. An ornament.

'Whose turn is it to fetch the water? It'll be suppertime soon,' mama asked us.

Papa was in front of the television watching the news.

I was laying the table. I said: 'It's Maria's turn. I went yesterday.'

Maria was sitting in the armchair with her dolls. 'I don't feel like it, you go.'

Neither of us liked going to the drinking fountain so we took turns, one day each. But papa had come home and to my sister this meant the rules no longer applied.

I gestured no with my finger. 'It's your turn.'

Maria folded her arms. 'I'm not going.'

'Why not?'

'I've got a headache.'

Whenever she didn't want to do something she said she had a headache. It was her favourite excuse.

'It's not true, you haven't got a headache, liar.'

'Yes I have!' And she started massaging her forehead with a pained expression on her face.

I felt like throttling her. 'It's her turn! She's got to go!'

Excerpted from I'm Not Scared by Niccolò Ammaniti. Copyright Niccolò Ammaniti 2002 all rights reserved. Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Canongate Publishing. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.

Translated from the Italian by Jonathan Hunt.