An Italian Wife, Ann Hood
An Italian Wife, Ann Hood
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An Italian Wife

Author: Ann Hood

Narrator: Cassandra Campbell

Unabridged: 8 hr 45 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/02/2014

Categories: Fiction, Women, Family Life

Synopsis

From the bestselling author of The Obituary Writer comes the stirring multigenerational story of an Italian family.An Italian Wife opens in turn-of-the-century Italy, when young Josephine Rimaldi is forced to follow her new husband to America in an arranged marriage and finds herself in a strange country with a man she doesn't know or love.Bound by tradition, she gives birth to seven children; the last, conceived in a passionate affair, Josephine must give up for adoption. Josephine spends the rest of her life searching for this child, keeping her secret even as her other children, whose stories unfold in surprising ways, go off to war, get married, and make their own mistakes: Her son suffers in World War I. Her daughter struggles to assimilate in the new world of the 1950s American suburbs. And her granddaughters experiment with the sex, drugs, and rock and roll of the 1970s.Poignant, sensual, and deeply felt, An Italian Wife is a sweeping and evocative portrait of a family bound by love and heartbreak.

About Ann Hood

Ann Hood is the author of more than a dozen books, including the bestselling novels The Book That Matters Most and The Knitting Circle, and three memoirs.

About Cassandra Campbell

Original bio sent from Cassandra: Cassandra Campbell began doing voice overs as the voice for Calvin Klein’s Italian commercials. This was followed by commercial and documentary recording in both English and Italian. She has recorded many audiobooks and has received several AudioFile Earphones Awards as well as an Audie® Award nomination. As an actress and director, she has worked at the Public, the Mint, the Berkshire Theatre Festival, Stagewest, Theatreworks, the Baltimore Shakespeare Festival, Millmountain Theatre, the National Shakespeare Company, and the New York Fringe Festival.  

Reviews

Goodreads review by Kristy on April 02, 2017

Everything you read in the other reviews is true. It's confusing. It's a collection of character sketches. It has awkward, unexpected, and even out-of-place sexual situations. I picked up this book because I loved Ann Hood’s The Obituary Writer so much, and I am the great granddaughter of a Sicilian......more

Goodreads review by Lynne on September 11, 2016

I listened to this through Overdrive on my phone courtesy of the Toledo Lucas County Public Library. The reader was phenomenal! It's basically a collection of short stories with interconnected characters. In every chapter there is sex. The story overall is only a little interesting. I really feel th......more

Goodreads review by Melody on September 11, 2014

I was given this book as part of the first reads giveaways in exchange for an honest review. Rather than a "typical" novel structure, this reads as a bunch of connected short stories, following an Italian family in America from the turn of the century to the mid-70s. Hood's prose is beautiful, even......more

Quotes

“I loved Ann Hood’s An Italian Wife in the same way I loved Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge—and for the same reason. The interconnected stories that fan out from a central character—in this case, matriarch Josephine Rimaldi—illuminate important truths about the ways in which our families, our ancestry, and the era into which we’re born shape who we become. An Italian Wife is a multigenerational masterpiece.” Wally Lamb, New York Times bestselling author of We Are Water

“An Italian Wife is glorious. The life of Josephine Rimaldi is the heart of this multi-generational family saga with deep, fertile roots in southern Italy. Reading this novel was like taking a luscious train ride through the last century. It soars with the power of Josephine’s dreams as she builds a life and family in America. Full of surprise and wonder, the writing is at turns poetic and sensitive, then dynamic and wise. Ann Hood is a master craftsman. This resplendent novel is a grand crescendo in a pitch perfect career.” Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author

“I admire this graceful and intimate writer for her literary sleight of hand: you don’t so much read about her characters as you inhabit them.” Elizabeth Berg, New York Times bestselling author, praise for the author

“Hood reinvents the family saga into something spellbindingly new and authentically alive…From turn-of-the-century Italy to 1950s American suburbia to the psychedelic 1970s, Hood shows how love and history transform a family, fuel—and sometimes kill—their dreams, and connect them in ways they never might imagine. Sweeping, sensual, and downright astonishing.” Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Is This Tomorrow and Pictures of You

“With each chapter a coming-of-age tale of an individual family member, Hood offers a poignant view of the turbulent twentieth century. She successfully displays the connected, ordinary lives of her characters, whom readers will come to love, appreciate, and enjoy. This intricately woven, engrossing narrative will delight Hood’s readers and attract fans of literary family sagas.” Library Journal

“Hood guides us through the complicated lives of a multigenerational Italian American family…Each generation seems to resist the traditions of the preceding one, until the tender relationship between Josephine and a great-grandson—a wonderful pairing—reveals that a love and respect of what (and who) came before often prevails.” Booklist

“A century in the life of an extended Italian American family…A soulful and multilayered book from this accomplished author.” Kirkus Reviews

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