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Suspense novelist and screenwriter Lorenzo Carcaterra (Payback; Sleepers)
shares an intimate, true story about three, strong-willed, determined women who
"saved" his life. Carcaterra--"the son of an ex-con and a
housewife who spoke only Italian [who] grew up in the Hell's Kitchen
neighborhood of Manhattan"--was raised watching his mother trapped in an
abusive, loveless, impoverished marriage to a man who had murdered his first
wife. When he was 14, Carcaterra's mother sent him to Ischia, Italy, to spend
the summer with his maternal grandmother, Nonna Maria, and other relatives. The
trip proved to be a watershed.
Nonna Maria--wise, dignified and of great
resilience--becomes a bedrock, championing her sensitive grandson, who has
storytelling aspirations. Upon returning to the U.S., Carcaterra grows
determined to forge a writing career, though his mother, Raffaela, belittles
his goal. Steeped in misery, Raffaela--a widow whose second marriage is to
Carcaterra's volatile father--often resents her son for being his bullying
father's offspring. Dutiful, devoted Carcaterra, however, stands by his mother
through some cruel, searing rejections. When Carcaterra meets Susan, an editor
and coworker at the New York Daily News, he finds a soulmate whose
love and support help turn the tide. Carcaterra finally launches his
novel-writing career and the couple build a beautiful, sadly shortened, life
together.
Many heart-wrenching incidents pervade the
traumatic landscape of Carcaterra's
life. But the richness of his forthright storytelling gives tender form to
sadness and loss, shaping it into a deeply moving narrative about hard-fought familial
love and forgiveness.
Three
Dreamers: A Memoir of Family by Lorenzo Carcaterra
Ballantine Books, $28.00
Hardcover, 9780593156711, 240 pages
Publication
Date: April 26, 2021
To order this book on INDIEBOUND, link HERE
NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being
posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (April 30, 2021), link HERE