Paradise, Nevada by Dario Diofebi, the ace of Las Vegas

Nothing is going anymore. In Las Vegas, dreams are shattered around green carpets. “Winners didn’t build this city”, reads the caption. Four characters revolve in the bowels of Positano, this luxury hotel which reproduces in detail the amalfi coast, with false cliffs and artificial sea as a bonus. The owner of the place is an agoraphobic septuagenarian and Howard Hughes billionaire. The casino is teeming with people. Dented destinies, gogos, girls who are not very shy and made up meet there.

There’s Ray, an online poker player who switched to real cards after the government put its big paws on the sites where he officiated; Mary Ann, a waitress who thinks only of her navel and flirts with depression; Tommaso, an Italian whose visa has expired and who hides his tickets in his underwear; last but not least, Lindsay, a local journalist who dreams of landing an interview with the mogul cloistered on the top floor. Ray…