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Megha Majumdar on Saeed Jones, Nancy Drew, and the Book With the Best Opening Line
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Jump to navigation David Briggs Gail Reitano sought to recreate the strength and agency of her Italian-American mother and grandmother in her new novel, Italian Love Cake. The book allowed her to explore Italy, which she said was missing for the generations that were in a fever to integrate.
By 05/19/2021
Gail Reitano’s first novel, Italian Love Cake, hit the shelves this month. Set on the eve of World War II, the novel features a young, second-generation Italian-American woman making her own way as a shopkeeper and baker in rural New Jersey. The narrative is political, delving into the growing divisions of a society preparing for war. Despite the increasingly dire circumstances, the plotline is driven by a fearless, hopeful and free-spirited lead character, Marie Genovese. Rejecting the patriarchal pressures of her reality, Marie claims her independence at every turn.
Natasha Gilmore, Idlewild Books and Open Borders Books, NYC
: This book contains two novellas and some short stories set around Colombia (and occasionally Miami). The narration is often low-affect, sharply cynical, and wryly observed. There’s a cutting honesty in the voice throughout the book that feels totally absent from so much literature now. It reminded me of the feeling of encountering something truly when I was a teenager. But then there’s just the crushing reality of coming into sexuality as a teen, colorism and racism in Colombia, the restlessness wrought by capitalism and the desire to flee yourself and the accidents of your birth that ultimately coalesce into something so universally resonant, that will make any reader feel seen and connected. Truly an author worthy of attention.