The Sicilian Inheritance by Jo Piazza
Published by Dutton
Publication date: April 2, 2024
Genres: Fiction, Cultural, Historical, Mystery
Bookshop
Sara is at a low point when her favorite aunt dies. Her well-reviewed restaurant has closed, she’s bankrupt, and her husband is leaving her and wants custody of their daughter. It’s a mixed blessing when she’s given a letter left to her by the aunt containing a final request, a deed for a piece of land in Sicily, and a plane ticket there. This is the intriguing groundwork laid out by Jo Piazza in her new novel, The Sicilian Inheritance.
Aunt Rosie has been Sara’s north star for most of her life thanks to her ‘take no prisoners’ attitude towards the world. She believed in Sara when she didn’t believe in herself, so while embracing depression is her first instinct she ignores it and heads to Sicily. The request, when she gets there, is not a simple one. Rosie wants to know the truth behind the death of the mother she never met. Family lore has it Serafina died from illness before she could join her husband and children in America. But the deed for the land has never been discussed.
There are two stories being told in The Sicilian Inheritance, that of Sara in the present day as she navigates the patriarchal culture of Sicily in an effort to get answers about the land and that of Serafina and her life in the early 1900s. Married while still a teen, she’s the mother to several young sons when her husband leaves for America to try and make a better life for them. Life in their small village is difficult and Sara finds much of it to be unchanged when she arrives.
The chapters in The Sicilian Inheritance alternate between the two women which could be jarring, but actually goes a long way to illustrating how little has changed on the island. On a broader level, she explores the same theme, but in a positive way, regarding women. Not just Serafina and Sara, but all of the women portrayed in the novel. They’re an eclectic group spanning a century, but aspects of each of them are recognizable to women everywhere.
Piazza is one of those writers whose talents can expand to deeper subjects (We Are Not Like Them) or float comfortably on the surface of vacation reading (Fitness Junkie). The Sicilian Inheritance falls in the sweet spot of the two. There is a mystery, twists and surprises, but there is the deeper message of the bonds between women. It makes for easy reading with a little something extra.
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