by Adriana Trigiani, 2012
Wonderful novel, set in early 1900’s to mid-1900’s, about young Italian immigrants, Ciro Lazzari and Enza Ravanelli. Ciro was an orphan, dropped off with his brother, Eduardo, at the convent in Vilminore, when he was a child. The nuns raise him. He’s strong and handsome. Enza, short for Vincenza, is the oldest daughter of a large family in Schilpario in the Italian Alps. They meet at age 15, when Ciro is hired to dig the grave for Enza’s baby sister, Stella. She falls in love with him and never stops loving him.
The novel takes you from Italy to New York City, where the young adults meet again in the hospital. They have both immigrated. She almost died from sea-sickness on the way over. Ciro has apprenticed as a shoemaker in Little Italy and cuts his hand badly when he’s thinking of other things. They meet off and on through the years but it’s frustrating how they never quite get together even though you know they are meant for each other.
Ciro joins the army and serves in WWI, trench warfare. Enza, a most-talented seamstress, and her Irish friend, Laura, escape from the factory in Hoboken, NJ, and make a successful go of it at the Metropolitan Opera in NYC. Enza becomes the seamstress for Enrico Caruso. She is loved by Vito Blazek, a successful marketing agent for the Opera. He asks her to marry him, she says yes. The morning of the wedding, Ciro finds her outside the church, waiting, and tells her he loves her (finally) and she cannot marry Vito, she must marry him. He’s just returned from the war. She forsakes the life of a rich, socialite, and marries Ciro. They move to Minnesota and become shoemakers in the town of Chisholm. They have one child, a son, named Antonio. He is everything. They are partners with Luigi and Pappina, who have child after child, while Enza and Ciro only have the one son, but he is beloved. Ciro gets diagnosed with cancer caused from mustard gas. He dies young, leaving Enza and Antonio. Enza and Antonio love him and miss him the rest of their lives, but they go on. Pappina dies in childbirth years later and Luigi decides to return to Italy with his 4 sons, leaving his 10-year old daughter, Angela, with Enza in Minnesota. Enza raises her as her own. It’s beautiful. Antonio, a young man, gets drafted into the army for WWII. The recruiters tell Enza that since she is a widow and he’s her only son, she could get an exemption for him. She knows he wants to serve, so she lets him go. This is 1940. She spends the next 4 years worried, praying, living, raising Angela, who is a beautiful young girl with a voice like an angel. Enza gets her into the voice school in NYC and she lives with Enza’s old friend, Laura, who is married to Colin, who is now the manager of the Met. The day Antonio returns from the war, he stops in NYC first to see his mom’s old friend, Laura, and Angela answers the door. He loves her instantly. She’s loved him as long as she can remember, just like Enza loved Ciro from the moment she met him. They get married and the book ends with Antonio and Angela going to take Enza home to Italy.
It’s a beautiful, lovely, heart-warming story about Italy, immigrants, war, New York City, opera, shoe-making, seamstresses, love, family, Minnesota. I loved it! I got it from a Little Free Library on our walk with Adam and Danette in Cooper Landing, AK, in August!!! I started reading it on the plane home but then had other books I had to read for book club, etc., and didn’t get to pick it back up until recently. It’s a wonderful book!
Adriana Trigiani has written other books, Big Stone Gap Series: Brava, Valentine; Very Valentine; Home to Big Stone Gap; Rococo; The Queen of the Big Time; Lucia, Lucia; Milk Glass Moon; Big Cherry Holler; Big Stone Gap.