The Islands of Divine Music

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Against a backdrop of Immigration, Prohibition, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Vietnam War, and the new millennium, the Verbicaro family make their way from Southern Italy to San Francisco to the Yucatan, finding ways to reinvent themselves as each of them brushes up against some aspect of the divine, or the profane. The family matriarch, Rosari, is a little girl whose family flees Italy because her prodigality is exploited by illiterate kidnappers. When she and her father reach San Francisco, she meets the man she ll marry, a handsome, fiercely strong peasant named Giuseppe Verbicaro. Rosari and Giuseppe s oldest son, Narciso, a handsome and dim-witted dandy, barely evades disaster by his simple-minded innocence and luck. His passionate brother Ludovico, a talented third-baseman in the old San Francisco minor leagues, falls prey to the illicit dreams of a wise guy from the Gambino family. Their youngest brother, Joe, a brilliant child and shrewd businessman, is ashamed of his ethnicity and, in particular, his father, in part because Giuseppe, wandering North Beach, believes that God directs him to marry a teenage, pregnant Mexican prostitute named Maria. Further senility, faith, or vermouth convinces the old man that Maria s child, Jesus, is the product of an immaculate conception. The event is both a family disgrace and a bizarre blessing. The child s life and death have a profound effect on Giuseppe s progeny, particularly Joe s children: Penelope, who flees the country following involvement in deadly anti-Vietnam War activities, and her brothers Paulie and Angelo, who are inspired by the young Jesus to embark upon a quest of several thousand miles to heal old wounds and recover the family s lost, but most-prized spiritual treasures.From BooklistIt’s rare to find a multigenerational saga in under 300 pages, but this brief novel covers five generations of an Italian family as they move from Italy to San Francisco. The story starts with Rosari and her father fleeing Italy after she accidentally commits a crime. The course of her family is forever altered when Rosari’s husband illegally marries a second wife, a pregnant prostitute. The story of Jesus, the prostitute’s son, intersects at odd moments with Rosari’s family. Much like the original Jesus, the boy stands for different things to different people. The lyrically written story is engaging, but its brevity is its weak point. Because each character is given such little space, the reader just begins to fall for a character when the story switches course. A moving appetizer that leaves one wanting the full meal. --Marta Segal Block ReviewAt the dawn of the 1900s, in Naples, precocious 11-year-old Rosari is sweet-talked into writing a ransom note for an illiterate gangster. That small moment sets in motion a chain of events that alters the course of her life. Forced to flee Italy, her family ends up in San Francisco, where Rosari meets Giuseppe Verbicaro, a ferociously determined laborer who will eventually become her husband. Their story, and the stories of their children and grandchildren make up Corvallis writer John Addiego's sprawling first novel, The Islands of Divine Music. Unfolding across the panorama of 20th-century America, the novel has the intimate feel of a short-story collection. Each chapter zeroes in on a family member, usually one who has arrived at a crossroad in life. These poignantly drawn character studies reveal the essence of each son or daughter. There's sharp-dressed Narciso, Guiseppe and Rosari's first son, who loves cars and women -- all of whom are so besotted by him they rarely notice he's slow-witted. Nicknamed Lucky Pants, he's the embodiment of the fool who is smiled on by God. There's Maria, a young Latina hooker who Giuseppe takes as a second wife (without bothering to divorce his first one) and her son Jesus, who end up living a tragic and hardscrabble lives as migrant farmworkers and who resurface in the lives of the Verbicaro family in surprising ways. And there's Paulie, whose dreams of baseball glory grow dim when he becomes nearsighted. Adrift, he ends up as a soldier in Vietnam and comes back as one of the many lost souls who seemingly left an essential part of themselves behind in that country. They're all searching for clues to their identity, and while the family members may wander in and out of each other's stories, in the end, each character faces his or her own fate and future alone. An Italian American family novel like this could feature characters straight out of central casting, but Addiego's lyrical prose and eye for detail bring Rosari's family to life in a way that feels rich and multidimensional. Reflecting the significant events and social movements of the past century through the lives of the Verbicaros adds yet another layer to this satisfying saga. --The Oregonian - Jeff Baker