Darswords

The Descendant by Linda Stasi
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Dina Pearlman narrates this family drama. Was it Linda Stasi’s writing or the narration that started me thinking of cowboy hats and tumbling tumble weeds? Yet there was Italian dialogue from the main charaters in Sicily. I should have recognized some of it my childrens great grandparents were from Sicily. Their grandparents used to speak to me phrases. My mother-in-law played: how is this in Spanish? It was often quite close. Yet how much did I remember of my high school Spanish? My Duolingo lessons are to read not listen or speak. So I was glad that the Italian phrases were followed by the English translation. I think my in-laws were first generation born in America. So as the story went on, and I realized it was biographical, I could trace what I learned through osmosis my children’s heritage. That’s when the book became personal. I remember reasons my father-in-law moved from the east coast to the west, to get away from the mafia.

This Audible version made this nonfiction more accessable. I do plan to get the Kindle version so I couldlisten while reading. I need to see the Italian to get it better. And it won’t feel like a spaghetti western. It will feel like family.

By the way, by the end of the book I was ready to read it again. Now that I understand more about the characters and how they relate to the story in history I want to sink into the whole world created from reality to a literature that feels like fiction.

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