An Italian memoir by Nancy Barone

3rd July 2022

All my Italies

From the snow-capped Alps to the smouldering Mount Etna in Sicily and Agrigento’s majestic Greek temples, from the Sardinian nuraghe to the trulli of Alberobello, there are so many Italies for everyone. Perhaps even too many to discover in a lifetime. But that’s half the magic of wandering through strange lands; never knowing what’s around the corner despite all the travel guides in your bag. Because 99% of the world’s cultural artefacts are in found in Italy.

And let’s not forget its natural beauty; who wouldn’t swoon sitting on the stone walls overlooking the Val d’Orcia in the province of Siena? Or standing on the church piazza in Caltabellotta, a true panoramic natural balcony smack dab in the middle of Sicily from where you have a 360° view of the entire island?

My visits to Italy were initially at six-year intervals. My first time was a trip to my parents’ native Sicily when I was only six. Having only swum in Lake Simcoe up to that point, I was excited to see how I would float in salt water. As I wasn’t (and still am not) a swimmer, I was hoping to cheat gravity by staying afloat without any exertion whatsoever. But that never materialised and I went back home to eventually learn to doggie paddle in Lake Simcoe. One thing however remained with me, and that is how intensely blue the Sicilian sea and sky were, unlike anything I’d ever seen before in North America.

My second big trip to Italy was to Lake Garda six years later when I was almost thirteen. It wasn’t the Mediterranean sea, but it was a different although equally intense blue. Only this time I was surrounded by impervious mountains riddled with galleries like foxholes. I loved hopping on and off the vaporetto (ferryboat) that stops at each harbour where restaurants, stalls and shops feature foods and wares of all kinds, from fettuccine to Ferragamo shoes. My favourite inlet was Sirmione, with all its colourful buildings and thick vegetation, with an international yet intimate atmosphere.

Another six years later, at nineteen, I was off to university in Tuscany. If I had considered myself well-read up to then, a huge surprise awaited me. Tuscany was and is all things centre of the cultural world. But it is not only the Renaissance and Da Vinci that everybody talks about; it is also the sunflower field opposite my dear friend’s home where I used to lie and read on lazy days, and another dear friend’s Fattoria di Piazzano winery in Empoli where we dreamt about our future in the shade of a huge olive tree.  Tuscany is also the Luminara in Pisa on the evening of the patron saint, San Ranieri, on June 16^th  when every year the historical buildings along the river Arno are framed with candles and the town lights are switched off and only light and water exist.

So it should not come as a surprise that I set my latest romcom trilogy (The Husband Diet, My Big Fat Italian Break-up and Storm In a D-Cup) in Tuscany, and precisely a fictitious town called Castellino.

After a bad divorce, my heroine Erica Cantelli dreams of moving to Tuscany from the United States and spends most of her free time trawling the internet for a farmhouse to turn into a B&B on her meagre budget. Castellino is truly the summary of everything I know and love. I once went to a village for a medieval summer festival. We ate roast meat cooked the way they did during the Renaissance times and paid in scudi. I was so mesmerised by the sense of community in that village that I wanted to move there!

It’s a good thing I didn’t though, otherwise I’d have never truly discovered my Sicily, the place my (British) husband and I ultimately chose to live after various life-changing events. I have seen quite a lot of Italy, but nothing can truly compare with the south where my next romcom is set, and precisely on the Sicilian island of Lipari, a true gem in the Mediterranean sea. Here, between a gelato and a boat ride hugging the coast, you can imagine my heroine Gilly Dobson as she meanders through the narrow streets, dumped (and hungry). But, between a cannoli and macallé, and of course passeggiatas with the dashing Mattia, she discovers how sweet it is to be desserted (pun intended) in Sicily.

I have lived well past half a century now and am still living in (and loving) Sicily. Come and see for yourself what all the fuss is about!

Nancy Barone

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