A Thousand Days in Tuscany: A Bittersweet Adventure (Hardcover)

~ Marlena de Blasi (Author) "Ce l'abbiamo fatta, Chou-Chou, we did it, he says, using the name he gave to me, clutching the steering wheel of the old BMW with..." (more)
Key Phrases: fine sea salt, San Casciano, December Has Come, Big Philip (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

From its opening scene of an impromptu alfresco village feast of fried zucchini blossoms, fennel-roasted pork, and pudding made from the cream of a local blue-eyed cow, this memoir of the seasons in a small Tuscan village is rich with food, weather, romance and, above all, life. De Blasi continues the adventures begun in her A Thousand Days in Venice, as she and her husband, Fernando, leave Venice for Tuscany in search of "a place that still remembers real life... sweet and salty... each side of life dignifying the other." Fortunately, the two are adopted by Barlozzo, an elderly local eager to share his knowledge of the old ways. He introduces them to the local customs: grape harvesting, truffle hunting, bread baking, etc. Although the book teems with food references, including recipes for intriguing traditional dishes, de Blasi is more than a sunny regional food writer—she digs into the meaning of life. As she fights Fernando's periodic depressions and brings him back to joy, gains Barlozzo's trust and love, learns his troubling lifelong secrets and comes to terms with the death of a beloved friend, she immerses her readers in life's poignancy, brevity and wonder.
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From Booklist

Readers who enjoyed de Blasi's earlier work, A Thousand Days in Venice (2002), may be startled that the author has moved from Venice to Tuscany. Still much in love with the man for whom she left everything, de Blasi embarks on an idyllic, if hardworking, Tuscan life. The couple purchases an old farmhouse and is chagrined that it's not conveyed in the condition promised. Their neighbors welcome them to the community with a groaning board featuring all manner of Tuscan foods and capped off with a dessert that only hours earlier had been milked from a "blue-eyed" cow. As in her earlier work, most chapters close with recipes, ranging in complexity from braised pork stew that serves as both a pasta sauce and an entree to simple bruschetta, toasted bread topped with local olive oil. Thanks to de Blasi's style of rendering conversations first in Italian, then English, a careful reader can quickly pick up some useful conversational Italian. Mark Knoblauch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 325 pages
• Publisher: Algonquin Books; Illustrated. edition (November 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1565123921
• ISBN-13: 978-1565123922
• Product Dimensions: 7.2 x 5.8 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #589,684 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More Enjoyable than Frances Mayes' Books, September 15, 2005

By	Italian Dreamer (Herndon, VA USA) - See all my reviews

Having lived and worked in Italy during the 60s and early 70s, I found Marlena De Blasi's recounting of her time spent in a very small town in Tuscany more in sync with what actually happens in such a place. It was easy for me to bring forth a picture in my mind and actually feel as if I was there. Mrs. Blasi's characterizations of persons encountered was complete.

I would highly recommend "A Thousand Days in Venice" as an accurate interpretation of what happens in Italy on a daily basis.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Feast for the Heart and the Soul........., July 4, 2005

By	Susan Desisto (Orange, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Do yourself a favor and read de Blasi's "A Thousand Days in Venice" before embarking on the sequel "A Thousand Days in Tuscany". It is not required reading, but you would be missing out on a delightful and unusual love story which sets up this book so perfectly.

Do not mistake this book for a cook book. It is so much more. De Blasi's writing is a feast of sumptuous descriptions of not only food, but life in Tuscany and the joy of knowing she is living her life exactly as she wants to. After reading the book, I was taken aback to find how strongly I wanted to meet this person and be a part of her circle of friends. She is as warm and senuous as the olive oil drizzled on the crusty, roasted, tuscan breads. This book could have been filled with photographs, but they weren't necessary. De Blasi's descriptions will fill your mind's eye with amazing visuals of life in rural Tuscany. I hope when you finish the book(s) you will feel, like I do, that your heart and soul have been amptly nourished .... and your taste-buds truly inspired!

47 of 54 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars LIFE AND LOVE IN TUSCANY, October 20, 2004

By	Gail Cooke (TX, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (VINE VOICE)

There's no doubt that she's ardent, intense; sometimes fiery. Marlena De Blasi is a passionate woman. Make that passionate with a capital P. A chef, she has a passion for food. Married to Fernando, a Venetian with "blueberry eyes, " she has a passion for Italy. Her exuberance is so contagious that readers will relish every page of "A Thousand Days In Tuscany" (as well as the recipe that ends each chapter).

Ms. De Blasi waxes so enthusiastically about her subjects that it almost seems she writes in bold print to extol the virtues of wild herbs, fresh cheese, and the Tuscan twilight. She is a firm believer in love, and an advocate of life, as well as the living of it.

As many will remember with "A Thousand Days In Venice," Ms. De Blasi first visited Italy perhaps a dozen years ago. On her first day there as she was sitting in a café with her traveling companions, she noticed an attractive man who seemed to be looking at her. Next, in true Danielle Steel style, a waiter told her that she had a phone call. It was, of course, the mysterious man urging her to meet him. She declined but returned to the café a few days later to find him there. They saw one another until she returned to St. Louis.

He soon followed. Fernando, we learned, was a banker who had never married. He would later say that he knew she was the one the moment he saw her. Although she did not share this initial surety she gave in to his pleas. Much to the astonishment and concern of her grown children and friends she returned with him to Venice where they married. She had imagined an apartment overlooking the Grand Canal. Instead she found a square concrete house on the Lido. Little did that matter - there was Fernando.

And, there is still Fernando who came home one day to announce that he has quit his job at the bank, and they're moving to Tuscany. A redone stable lacking central heating, a phone, and other amenities in the small village of San Casciano dei Bagni becomes their new home. It does boast a closet size kitchen with a refrigerator akin to what one might find by a hotel mini bar. She writes of their contract with the stable owner: "There had been a well-defined agreement with Signora Lucci that the house would be clean and that it would be empty. Neither is the case." The signora's furniture is "all in the form of irrefutable junk."

Nonetheless, the ever resourceful De Blasi is soon trimming the windows in her Venetian drapes complete with tasseled tiebacks, and delighting in her first taste of fried zucchini blossoms. The bar or restaurant in the village becomes almost their second home. It is there that they meet the villagers and take their morning espresso.

They're adopted by an elderly gentleman, Barlozzo, who tells fascinating stories and indoctrinates them into the ways of the region. He teaches them how to pick olives- one by one, harvest grapes, and hunt for wild mushrooms. Florina or Flori becomes another special friend. She of the shy smile and warm heart. Times, we learn, have changed very little in San Casciano dei Bagni.

It is here by the site of the ancient Roman baths, where Horace and Ottaviano Augustus vacationed, that Ms. De Blasi learns "the great secret that living in the moment and being content with one's portion makes for the best of all lives."

If the reader is fortunate, that is only one small lesson learned during this idyllic sojourn in the Tuscan hills.

- Gail Cooke