Florence and Me / Torino and Me by Elaine Bertolotti

These two memoirs by Elaine Bertolotti create a picture of a how Italy and Italian culture had a hand in shaping the life and character of an American woman who was lucky enough to spend five five years in Florence, and, later, her married life just outside of Turin.

The subtitle of the 64-page memoirs Florence and Me is The story of how the city of Florence befriended an American girl from Brooklyn.  The subtitle of the 60-page memoirs Turin and Me is The story of how a girl from Brooklyn ended up in the province of Turin.  Both books boast lovely watercolor images created by the author who is also an artist.  The best bargain on these books is probably if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited at Amazon.  I received them as review-copies.

The author's prose is conversational and coveys her exuberant personality.  She comes across as a positive, happy, enthusiastic extravert.  She is also impatient, impulsive and very confident.  When the author writes of her life in a village on the outskirts of Turin her voice becomes less excited and striving, and more content and joyous.  Her life in Italy has been good, and she recognizes the blessings she has enjoyed there.

Florence and Me is dedicated "To everyone who loves Florence".  The author certainly loves the city, and she loved her time living there for five years beginning in 1971.

Ah, Firenze, the good old days when I was a young girl, thoroughly innamorata (in love) with one of Italy's most beautiful cities!

The excitement of every day being a new experience was intoxicating for the young version of the author.  Anyone who has lived abroad for any length of time will recognize the exhilaration that the author describes, mainly through adapted excerpts from her lengthy letters written to her parents back in the States.  The tense variations in the text often show which passages were taken directly from the youthful letters and which where added recently, with hindsight, by the mature author.

On living abroad:

...the laughter and joy of living each new day as a surprise.

On living in another culture:

...brought along with it fresh new outlooks on the ordinary day-to-day experiences.

Have you never been to Florence?  Here is a two-minute intro to the city's beauty:

I especially enjoyed the author's very realistic portrayal of her learning Italian.  Language learning, even when it is learned where it is spoken, progresses in phases.  The author describes those phases perfectly. 

The chapters are divided by subject:  language learning, her apartment, the family back home, studying art...  This only child had a very supportive family back home, but they were also the main reason she eventually returned to the States.  But the pull of Italy was too strong, and the author ended up returning to Italy, eventually to marry and rear her children.  But for those five years in the '70s the author and her American roommate lived a charmed life in Florence.

Florence never let us down, she befriended us and let us make our home there so we could create treasured memories.

The 1970s don't sound so long ago, but they were a very different era than the '80s and beyond in Italy.  So many changes occurred in the 1980s in Italy that many Italian writers have been focusing recently on those days before the monumental changes occurred.  A handful of TV channels, moderate tourism, an innocence about foreign cultures, low divorce and lots of pampered children made for a different Italy than one finds today.

Today is the era that predominates in Turin and Me.  We learn a bit about the author's shock when she discovers that after learning Italian she is unable to understand the locals in her new hometown just outside Turin.  The locals speak a dialect.  Actually, outside of Tuscany, which is home to the "Italian" that was chosen as the national language, a lot of Italians speak dialects, which comes as a shock to many people.

Never been to Turin (Torino)?  Here is a two minute intro to the monumental city:

The story of how the author met her husband-to-be comes late in the memoirs, and it would have been fun to read a bit more about that than was provided.  The early parts of the memoirs relate to her life and to Turin and the surrounding Piedmont region. 

We get a good idea of what daily life in Italy today is like, when living in a small town near a major city:  shopping, free-time, cooking, gardening, eating out...  The author has enjoyed living abroad.

There is great satisfaction when you live in another country.  It's like starting in all over again.

The author loves her life, and she succeeds in conveying her enthusiasm and love of her adopted hometowns of Turin and her village.  She is still spontaneous and impatient like when she lived in Florence, and her curiosity, energy and adventurous spirit have survived the years intact, but there is a definite contentedness in the later writing.

I fell in love with Florence and now I have a nice warm and friendly feeling about Turin.

From the description of Florence and Me:

How an American girl lived in the fantastic city of Florence, Italy!

A true story of how Elaine lived a most extraordinary lifestyle, learning the Italian language, meeting interesting people while teaching English, and exploring the most beautiful city in Italy.  Many incidents were laughable and often embarrassing, as she attempted to become an adopted “Fiorentina”.  However, these unforgettable experiences rewarded her with a profound sense of accomplishment.  Her grandparents, born in Italy, would have been proud of her!!!

The atmosphere in her beautiful Florence was such that she felt completely invincible. Her stay there was in the middle ‘70s and the city today has undoubtedly changed, but she likes to think of herself as one of the pioneers who paved the road for the hundreds of Americans who are choosing to live there even now.

“I am a proud Italian American, born and raised in Brooklyn, New York who never would forget her native country and all her beauties. I feel that it was definitely destiny that took my hand and led me to Italy. My heart is in love with my both countries. I’m a lucky girl!!” – Elaine.

 

From the description of Turin and Me:

A personal memoir of an American girl living in the province of Italy.

Turn and Me is the second book in the, ...and Me Series

After having spent 5 years living in Florence, Italy, I returned for 2 years in the States before I finally came back to my Italia.  The man who was to be my husband, was from the province of Turin, so that's where I ended up!

I found that I had to deal with new experiences with the language and the traditions "alla Piemonese" in the small town that I was to live in.  I discovered the city of Turin, a new Italian city to admire in all its beauty.

Here are direct links to the books at Amazon.com:

Please visit the author on Pinterest and Facebook .  She has other memoirs in the works.  Visit her Amazon Author Page.  Here is the link to the author's brief guide (lists of tips) for tourists visiting Italy.

There is a new e-book out by the same author called It Could Only Happen in Italy!!  Here is my review from Amazon.com:

Elaine loves to share her adventures and misadventures in Italy in various formats, this time being a short farce-play about a couple in Rome and Florence, and their attempts to help their heartbroken daughter who is with them.  At the end of the play, there are some sightseeing tips and Italian four recipes.  She's an American ex-pat who lives in Italy with her Italian husband, so the recipes are authentic!  Some laughs, some good tips, some good recipes.

Visit her Amazon Author Page too see all her e-books.



This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Tempesta's Dream by Vincent B. "Chip" LoCoco

The subtitle of Tempesta's Dream is A Story of Love, Friendship and Opera.  The Tempesta of the title is Giovanni Tempesta, a twenty-five-year-old Italian man living in 1979 in Milan, Italy.  Giovanni dreams of becoming a world-class opera tenor, but he earns a living as a clerk by day, and an opera-café singer by night.

The Prologue explains how Giovanni came to discover opera:  through his father, a consummate romantic and opera aficionado.  Franco Tempesta explains to his young son how opera is romance and raw emotion put to poetry and music.  Opera also touches how the man teaches his son about love.

When you fall in love, Giovanni, always respect that trust the girl places in you.  You would only expect the same from her.  For it is from trust, that true love finds its roots.  And love is what gives our life poetry.

 Puccini is Giovanni Tempesta's favorite composer, so I will feature images of Puccini opera posters with the review .

Without realizing it, Franco rears his son to be something of a throwback to an earlier idea of male-female relations.  That formal, respectful attitude to women, love, and relationships was out of place even in 1979.  It reminded me a bit of the 1999 film Blast from the Past, which was about a young man who grew up since the 1960s with his mother and father in a bomb shelter, and only entered the world in 1999. 

Giovanni has the same sweetness and intensity about him, so that we can almost forgive his following his love-at-first-sight woman home.  Giovanni is, as the author says:

...a passionate romantic living in a very unromantic world.

And when Giovanni serenades the woman:

He was a throwback to a lady's old romantic notion of how a man should act.

Falling in love pushes Giovanni to pursue his dream with more conviction.  With ups and downs, lessons and sudden lesions, successes and failures, we follow Giovanni's progress to his ultimate success.  The satisfying, joyous ending has a truly operatic feel to it, musically, situationally and emotionally.  It is a big-opera finish.

A few years back there was a novel written for young adults that had a father teaching his daughter about the history of philosophy.  Many adults read the book for the easy-to-grasp explanations.  Tempesta's Dream has the same feel to it, but for a history of opera.  The book's coyness about sex makes it a suitable book for both adults and young-adults.  The opera history and entertaining anecdotes that Giovanni's teacher, Alfredo, shares with his eager student make learning easy for the reader, too. 

The author brings opera to life on the page, which he achieves through the use of the libretto texts, and rich descriptions of the music and of the emotions the music creates.  What I would love to see is a Spotify playlist created by the author to accompany the book.  When reading the book and a piece of music is mentioned in the text, one could then click on a music player and hear the music.  It would be a lovely accompaniment to the text, which is about the music, after all.

Perhaps after reading the book and listening to the music, the readers will be like Giovanni:

Giovanni always had music running through his head.  Moments he experienced in life recalled for him scenes from operas.

A small part of the story takes place in the city of New Orleans, in the southern U.S. state of Louisiana, the author's hometown.  The flavor of the unique city comes through in the locations, food, history, people and music included in the story.  

The large Italian-American (Sicilian-American) community in New Orleans may be a surprise to some readers.  The immigrants richly contributed to the local culture.  It was just one of the reasons I accepted a review-copy of this book.

Here is the book's trailer:

Italian culture and Italian-American culture are often intertwined with a Catholic up-bringing.  I applaud the author for including Giovanni's faith in the book, and treating it as an aspect of his character.  Too many authors are afraid that if they allow their character's faith to appear in a book, the book will be labeled a "Christian Novel". 

Giovanni believes in God and in destiny.  Destiny for Giovanni is not un-Catholic "fate".  Destiny for Giovanni is what happens when we use to the utmost all the gifts God has given us.  Giovanni feels that God has given him a voice that moves people, so he feels compelled to develop that gift to its utmost.  It is one of the things that fuels Giovanni's ambition.

The book is attractively presented, well-edited, and offered in various formats, including an audio book.  The omniscient narrative prose is not always the smoothest it could be, and the dialog can be stilted at times, but the directness of the prose suits direct and single-minded Giovanni Tempesta, and in the end, this is Giovanni's story. 

True to the opera it honors, the book is full of strong emotions, heart, tears, love, ambition, friendship and an underlying decency.  I enjoyed it and it had me turning to my opera recordings, which is always a good thing!

From the book's description (some spoilers):

Tempesta's Dream is a novel by New Orleans writer, Vincent B. "Chip" LoCoco.  It is the story of an aspiring opera singer coming of age in Milan; a tender and moving love story; a testament to the bonds of friendship; and, at its core, a tribute to the beauty, majesty and miracle of opera.

Giovanni Tempesta always dreamed of becoming an opera tenor and one day singing from the stage of the La Scala Opera House in his hometown of Milan, Italy.  But with no real training, his dream has little chance for fulfillment . . .  One day, he meets and immediately falls in love with Isabella Monterone, a dark-haired beauty, whose father, a very rich and powerful Milanese Judge, refuses to allow his daughter to date a penniless musician . . .  At the lowest part of his life, Giovanni comes upon the Casa di Riposo, a rest home for musicians established by the great opera composer, Giuseppe Verdi . . .  It is at the Casa Verdi that Giovanni meets Alfredo del Monte, a blind, retired opera singer with a secretive past who gradually becomes his mentor . . .  Could Alfredo be the one person who could assist Giovanni in finding the break he needs? Or is Giovanni destined to be on the cusp of reaching his life long dream, only to find failure? . . .  Tempesta's Dream, at its core, is an Italian opera love story.  The author tells the story simply and swiftly with an ending that is both an emotional and poignant moment of both "amicizia e amore" (friendship and love.)

Here are direct links to the book at Amazon.com as paperback, e-book and audiobook:

Here is the book's audiobook trailer, which includes a sample of the audiobook:

 

Please visit the author's website and Facebook page,

I can't end a review of a book about opera without one opera video, so here is a music video of a piece that plays an important roll in the book, sung by someone who plays an even more important role.

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

The Confessions of Frances Godwin by Robert Hellenga

Frances Godwin, a fictional character, narrates her confessions, written late in life, part memoir, part mea culpa.  She spends sections of her life in Italy's Florence, Rome, and Verona, and these times have a great impact on her psyche.  Francis spends much of her life immersed in the Latin and Italian languages.  These are the reasons I requested a review copy of this book.

The book is divided into four parts.  The first part explains how her "Confessions" come to exist.  The second part relates how she acquired a husband and child.  The fourth part describes her life with her husband and daughter.  The last part brings us up to date with the last part of her life.

The narrative style of the book is first person, ruminative, almost stream-of-consciousness.  The narration is rich with detail about the place and time described.  Rome, 1963 comes to life, for example.  People feel real, but they are all described through the lens of Frances Godwin. 

The text is peppered with Latin and Italian words, two languages Francis speaks well.  She is a Latin teacher, and she learned Italian in school and from traveling in Italy.  When Francis uses Latin or Italian words and phrases, she always provides a translation.

I thought Italian would be less traumatic than English.  But keeling in the deep shadows of the confessional I started to speak in Latin.  "pater, pecavi..."

"Piano, piano," the priest said.  Slow down.  "Did Father Adrian send you to test my Latin?"

"Non," I said.

"Start over," he said.  "This time in Italian."

Francis provides not just her history, but inadvertently through herself and her family and others in the book, she provides a sort of social history of American Catholics during the years, too. 

Francis Godwin is a parochial woman, but Francis's mother is deeply conservative.  Francis's parents come from farm stock, from Poland.  We get the feeling that their Catholic faith is perhaps the only thing keeping these people on a moral track in life.

The book is rich with a love of Latin, and literature, and the arts and Italy.  The character is knowledgeable about Ancient Roman history and loves to mention that, too.  This book would make a nice gift for classicists and fans of Ancient Rome. 

There is a real sense of the academic life in the book, since Francis and her husband were professors.

If you're part of a small liberal arts college, you don't need religion.  You don't need a church.  The college will provide all the tings the people used to expect from a church:  a sense of community, an active interest in the large questions about the meaning and purpose of human life, and even a memorial service when you die.

We get hints of surprises to come, along the way, then the book takes a different turn after the halfway point.  I found Francis not always convincing as a real person.  Perhaps because she is so different from me.  And she has a love of detail but a lack of character depth, which she acknowledges late in the book.

I imagine some readers will connect with the long life lived and loved and celebrated in the details in Confessions, especially women of a certain age who have loved one man for a long time, and who have struggled with hopeless children. 

This is a sad book, at least in my opinion.  I did not find it particularly funny, despite what the publisher's blurb says.  The rambling, first-person narration lost its charm for me at a certain point, and the abundance of un-necessary detail became distracting.

Religion is a key element in the book.  The protagonist veers away from her religion, and then is drawn back to it by her own conscience that was well developed by her devout mother and a religious education.  In her confessions, Francis Godwin deals with life and death, and guilt and remorse.  She ruminates on love, and on the meaning of life.

Here is reading by the author of a previous books of his, which sounds in a very similar style to The Confessions of Francis Godwin, especially in the ruminative details.

From the book's description, which, as usual, gives a bit too much away, in my opinion:

An unforgettable and refreshingly witty narrator struggles to validate her life in this new novel from the bestselling author of The Sixteen Pleasures.

The Confessions of Frances Godwin is the fictional memoir of a retired high school Latin teacher looking back on a life of trying to do her best amidst transgressions—starting with her affair with Paul, whom she later marries.  Now that Paul is dead and she’s retired, Frances Godwin thinks her story is over—but of course the rest of her life is full of surprises, including the truly shocking turn of events that occurs when she takes matters into her own hands after her daughter Stella’s husband grows increasingly abusive.  And though she is not a particularly pious person, in the aftermath of her actions, God begins speaking to her.  Theirs is a deliciously antagonistic relationship that will compel both believers and nonbelievers alike.

From a small town in the Midwest to the Piazza Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome, The Confessions of Frances Godwin touches on the great questions of human existence:  Is there something “out there” that takes an interest in us?  Or is the universe ultimately indifferent?

The Confessions of Frances Godwin is published by Bloomsbury Publishing, and in the United States by Bloomsbury USA.

Direct link to the book and author's page at B-UK

Direct link to the book and author's page at B-USA

Here are direct links to the book at Amazon.com

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Letters Home by Glenda Helms

Letters Home begins in June 1970.  The narrative is pieced together from the author's letters home from Europe, and letters to her husband, and from a diary the author kept during that period.  There are also a few letters written by her husband, who served in the Air Force, to her.  Now and then the author adds some explanatory text to help us understand what is happening in their lives at a certain moment.

I enjoyed Letters Home.  It is well-written and well-edited.  It flows nicely, chronologically, and the Postscript gives us some closure.  I would have loved to have seen photographs in the book to accompany the story, especially when specific photos are mentioned.  The beauty of e-books is that photos can be added easily to the book file, so I hope that in future, the author adds a few to the memoirs.

1971, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in Portofino, Italy

Letters Home feels like the contents of a time-capsule from over forty years ago that has been opened and made public.  That feeling comes not only from the far greater number of European military bases in that period, but also to the social and economic situations in America and Europe.  What I found most striking was the depiction of innocence and decency in the U.S. that seems to have been replaced in forty years time by much harshness and crudity.

Perhaps the contrast is so strong due to the decency of the narrator and her husband, and of their families?  Perhaps it is because of the lovely, human details included in the book, and the direct, honest, simple narrative style?  Or perhaps the contrast is so strong because a major crude and rude-ification of U.S. society has taken place in the past forty years?  I will leave the answer to that question to you.

 

 

For a taste of the decency I mean, here is the author writing about her homesickness:

My mom was the best though.  She was a wonderful writer and always wrote details of what was going on in everyone's life back home.  She kept me up on family news, and news from old friends who were getting engaged, getting married, and other girl chit chat.

The closeness between the author and her family is touching, especially for someone like me, who has never experienced that.  Her family's loving support inspired the author to take a chance on a man she barely knew, and to move to the other side of the world to be with him.  The couple's time abroad, living in foreign cultures, brought them closer.  Overcoming the difficulties together created a bond between them that lasts to this day.  The stresses of the military life, however, did not help all the marriages described in the book.

Here is the author telling her husband about her mother's blessing:

Mother said to me that the angels must have been watching over me when I found you, and that's the way I feel.

 

Some 1970s nostalgia...

The largest portion of the book covers the time the couple lived in Italy.  That is why I requested a review-copy of Letters Home.  The couple lived near Brindisi on the heel of Italy's boot, and they took every opportunity to travel through Italy and Europe.  The economically depressed, and socially hyper-conservative area of Italy they lived in was understandably difficult to adjust to.  They enjoyed their escapes to the wealthier, more relaxed areas of Italy and Europe.

Here is the author quoting a salty soldier's opinion of San Vito, the base's location:

A guy on the base says that if they gave the world an enema, San Vito is where they would stick it in.

I traveled through Europe in the early 80s, and I lived in Italy through much of the later 80s, and I have visited often since then.  I can honestly say that I notice very little difference between Italy of the 70s and Italy now, except for a price inflation that has made living in Europe more expensive than living in the U.S.  Socially, Italy is still nearly a generation behind the U.S., and the south of Italy is even further behind.  The younger generation struggles to pull the society around them into the first-world's twenty-first century.

 

 

President Richard Nixon Greets Washington Senators Catcher Jim French after their Win over Brewers

Here is the author's first impression when she and another military wife arrive in Rome:

We arrived at the airport in Rome anticipating getting on another plane that would take us to Brindisi.  To our dismay, we missed our flight by minutes.  We were heartbroken.  We now had to endure sitting at the airport most of the day while exhausted, dirty, and disappointed, waiting for the next flight.  I discovered right away at the airport that Italian men were way too attentive.

That sometimes-aggressive attention from men has changed a bit, but not much.  Misogynistic comments and behavior are still common, and the social conservatism is still most striking southern Italy.  The author and her husband also very quickly encountered a rip-off-foreigners mentality that has characterized too many Italians for generations.  They also noticed the poverty and the filth, most noticeable by comparison when they traveled to spotless Austria, Switzerland, Germany and Holland.

 

Brindisi, Italy, which I know first hand to be a rather horrible town, a base for ferries to Greece, and the home of money-grubbing, unhelpful ticket sales offices, and female-hounding sleezeballs.

The couple decide, for some unknown reason, to get married in Italy.  The bureaucratic hurdles they have to jump are the same for pretty much anything in Italy today, from getting a telephone, permits, driver's license, etc.

One account of their time in Italy struck a strong cord with me.  Their rented apartment is broken into and they are robbed.  The author's husband becomes very worried for her safety since she is often home alone for long periods of time, so he sends her back to The States early, to keep her safe, and to give him peace of mind, but they both suffer greatly from the separation.

A decade after their misadventure, I met an American soldier who experienced a similar thing, near Naples, and he and his wife made the same decision, with the same suffering.  He explained that, sadly, the apartments of American service people in Italy are routinely targeted by Italian criminals.  The wife of the soldier in Naples was raped during the robbery.

 

 

The subtitle of the book is The Story of an Air Force Wife, and the account could be seen as something that generic, but it is really so much more.  There are many Air Force wives described in the book, friends of the couple.  There are also many Air Force men described in the book.  But this is really the story of one specific Air Force wife and her husband.  The two were lucky to have found each other, and bright enough to recognize what they had found:  their perfect partner in life.

On the cover of the book you see in a photo the smiling faces of the author and her husband from about the time the letters were written.  I've heard it said many times before by people looking at soldiers and their spouses, and I found the thought running through my mind:  They're just kids; so young!  When one thinks of them getting married and moving around the world, one can't help but imagine that their story could not have gone well, but it did go well.

 

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis at Rome's Airport in 70s

The 1970s in the U.S. are usually portrayed as a time of domestic strife dealing with a controversial foreign strife, and of growing social change.  That does not come across very strongly in this book.  Politics are barely touched upon, and the opposition to the Cold War's hot wars is not mentioned at all.

The social changes, mainly the growth for women in education, employment and in reproductive and health decisions, are touched upon to a greater extent, because the author is a woman who seeks to get an education and employment.  She also chooses to postpone having children until her husband leaves the Air Force, with her husband in full agreement, but there is no real discussion of the new sexual freedom that was ushered in with reliable birth control, The Pill.

There is only one mention of birth control, when a young Air Force wife has an unexpected pregnancy because she never learned about birth control from, as the author says, her mother.  Although the author doesn't discuss birth control in any detail at any point in the book, I assumed that she was using The Pill.  So I kept waiting for a connection to be made between the author's serious problems with hair loss, and the very high-dosage birth control pills that were used at that time, but the connection was never made.  Hair loss, for both men and women, is directly linked to hormonal levels, but the doctors kept sending her to dermatologists!

Here is the author talking about her frustrations as a military housewife:

I had a nice long talk with Sheryl last night.  We both miss those long calls with our mothers, and we both get tired of the menial tasks of housekeeping.  We wish there was something more exciting for us to do here.

The author encountered the prejudice of the military command, who believed military wives were only there to make comfy homes for their husbands, not to work.  The military at that time spent a fortune on shipping in and housing Americans to do civilian jobs that the military spouses could have done.

Jack Nicklaus Watches Pres Ford's Golf Swing at Inverrary Classic, Lauderhill, Florida, Feb 2, 1975

I found this time-capsule book a fascinating read.  Because of my age, I could see what had changed in the forty or so years since the letters were written.  I could also see what had not changed much in that time.  I find myself wondering what younger readers might make of the book?  And what might military spouses think of it?  Has life for the spouses changed that much? 

When people call themselves Italophiles, it is because they love the beauty, and the rich culture and history of Italy, including the musical language.  The authors, too, loved those aspects of Italy, but like all foreigners who live for a time in Italy, they admit that there are many negatives to Italian life.  In Letters Home you can read about the past struggles and the joys of this charming couple, the cumulative effect of which made them Italophiles.

 

 

President Jimmy Carter Talking with Reporters, Jan 24, 1977

From the book's description:

In the 1970's, Glenda met the love of her life, Michael, a Sgt. in the Air Force. She left her family and all that was familiar to follow him to Italy where they married.  During the next eight years, they were sent to Italy and Germany where their lives were filled with adventure, travel, hardships, and homesickness as they experienced the magic of Europe together.

Letters Home is available as an e-book, in various formats, via Smashwords, a major on-line e-book store.  You can sample the first 20% of the book for free.

Direct link to Letters Home e-books at Smashwords

The Kindle e-book and the paperback edition of Letters Home are both available from Amazon.com.  Here are direct links to both:

Visit the author's Facebook page.  Here is a link to the Wikipedia article about the San Vito Air Force Base.

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.