Fiction. Italian American Studies. Ever wonder about the step-by-step of the lives of forebearers in homelands lost, left & returned to? About what life was really like in all fullness & detail, real & frail, on both ends? Wish for unforced narrative in explosive situations, redolent of family, betrayal and murder? Imagine instead of a bridge across the ocean, separating life there and life here, a tunnel connecting great characters & ideas, all of a piece & seamless? Panella beams us in.--Anthony Valerio