Customer Reviews

Home to Italy

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I read this book strictly from the recommendation of a friend. When I read the first chapter I thought "Oh no! I'm going to have to keep a box of tissues next to me, this is going to be depressing!" Actually, "Home To Italy" was the complete opposite. The author's writing style flows in such an easy, laidback manner that you can't help but want to finish it. The writing is not rushed but it doesn't drag either. Nothing is forced like so many authors try to do today.

I won't tell you the entire story but the gist of it is that the main character, Peppi, loses his wife and decides to go "home to Italy". He meets his best friend's daughter, Lucrezia, who is a spitfire. She hides behind a wall of agressiveness because she has a broken heart.

Through Peppi's homecoming the author invites you to visualize this country's landscape, people, smells, and culture with Peppi's love of bike riding as a backdrop. All of the characters have distinct personalities that fit the piece of this book puzzle. You don't wonder the relevance of any character in the book. Even the two train riders Peppi meets on his way home help to weave this story together for Peppi and Lucrezia. Subtle humor is carefully placed throughout many of the situations. I like the idea of Peppi and Lucrezia finding love again even when they try their best to fight it. I also like the way the author has you visualize this love blooming without writing a bunch of sex scenes to taint your visualizations.

Great book with a great ending. I see a movie script here and look forward to reading more works from this author. Buy this book, you won't be disappointed.

Although the ending is apparent from the first few chapter of the book, it is a worthwhile read. It deals with the agony of a man who has had a tremendous loss, in a spouse and in his homeland. Although he spent decades in the USA, his homeland is still Italy, and as soon as he returns there he, and the rest of us, knows that he re-discovered his home, and now knows where he should be. His cycling was a good back-drop and added to the continuity of the story. The ending, although anticipated, seems a little far fetched, but perhaps not for the characters in the story.

Peter Pezzelli. An Unknown Author who comes from the smallest of states and produces the biggest thing in his life. It's a beautiful novel about love,family, and most of all food. The way he describes the smells of the food whafting through the kitchens of the Villa San Giuesspe. His accounts of character plot and emotions that only a True Italian could bring out. I've read this book and It reminds me of the story's my father would tell me when I was around 11 or 12 of my great grandmothers home in Italy. This book truely camptures the feel of the country and brings it all together in a amazing performance. I thimh that this book is truely what writing is all about.

A sweet, enjoyable story about a widower who returns to the land of his birth and finds warm acceptance wherever he goes. This is the old world as you wish it were. Who knows, maybe in some places it still is. The parts about the cult of bicycle racing and its mystique in Italy were illuminating.

It's funny -- I read this book and "Five Quarters of the Orange" back to back, and although both are about village life in Europe, the contrast between the two populaces is striking -- EVERYONE that the widower meets is kind to him, whereas quite the opposite is true in the other book. This book doesn't pretend to be great literature, but it's not at all mawkish, the story is quite interesting, and it leaves you with a kind of warm-hearted good feeling when you finish.

Peppi leaves Italy for America, marries within a year, buries his wife after forty-five years of childless marriage, decides to return to his home town, match makes two young Italians on a train, finds his very old friend waiting for the Sunday bike ride they last did fifty years earlier, meets his old friend's ravishing if cold, widowed daughter, integrates himself seamlessly into local life, rescues the damsel in distress, succumbs to the inevitable, and ends up asserting that his son will rebuild the family homestead if this seventy-year old first-time papa doesn't live to see it through to completion.

Like a thin-crust pizza, "Home to Italy" is tasty if flat and clichéd. Set aside the forty-six plus year gap between visits to Italy along with the minimum of twenty-five year age difference in the couple and you can enjoy yourself without spending too much time pondering the algebra. The book is populated with Italian stereotypes of rabid cyclists, fast drivers, winding roads, automobile accidents, world-class home cooking, barbershop characters, perfect nights, beautiful sunsets, aromatic dishes, stunning women, intuitive mothers, and romantic if clumsy men. A very rapid, easy, even engaging read, "Home" may satisfy some of your longing for a return to one's roots or for an highly improbable story of romance with a beautiful woman in a man's golden years.

This first novel, sadly, reads like one. The prose is so lacking in polish that I really thought I was reading the work of a high schooler. As far as the story....predictable and rather hard to believe. Please note: I love Italy and cycling, so I thought this would be right up my alley, but, among the many, many books written by Americans who try to capture the essential essence of Europe, this one fails to satisfy. Just one man's opinion.

What a heartwarming and romantic tale. Not only about the love for another, but the love of a childhood and a love of the old country. I was especially fond of the emotional dance between Peppi and Lucrezia.

I have read all 3 of his books and finished each in one day. Once you get hooked you can't put them down. If you are Italian or know Italians this will all ring a bell as to how they relate to one another as friends and family.

This is the second book I've read by this author, and they've both been warm, enjoyable reads. This one left me smiling, glad about the future life of the main character - which is how I want to be after reading a book.

Peppi (short for Peppino - Mario, to be exact) is despondent since being widowed. He decides eventually to return to his home village in Italy, where he and his good friend Luca used to race their bikes, as many men did - and still do. Once he is there, he fits in wonderfully, makes decisions that will improve the quality of his life - but finds a big disappointment in the house he'd hoped to live in. No big deal - this is one determined guy! Older, smart and resourceful is Peppi. There's a love story entwined here, which gives people like me (I'm nearing 80 years old!) such a good feeling. The Italian phrases used by Peppi and his family and friends make my heart feel good, too. I'm not Italian but have loved everything about them most of my life. Peppi's friends are such fun to read about; the character development was what it should be.

For anyone wanting a great story, things that work out in the end, and a satisfying smile on their face afterward, this is it!!

I really enjoyed this book. It was a good combination of a love story, without being a tear jerker, a story about generational values and about life in the US vs. life in Europe. What first started out as light reading ended with me not being able to put this book down until I finished it. It didn't have all the ridiculous turns and twists that make many books unbelieavble. It didn't have violence or graphic sex or graphic language and yet it was compelling and enjoyable. It is nice to see other authors that can write this way and still attract readers of various ages and interests. I look forward to reading this author's other books.