Selected Works

Nonfiction
A look at life in little-known mountain towns of the Sicilian hinterlands.
A true account of the last years of an ancient Sicilian giant bluefin tuna trap.
Clemente Ventrone bathing in the Chamber of Death after a mattanza. Mid 1990s.

Rais Salvatore Spataro, circa 1993, supervising the setting of the Chamber of Death floor.

Gioacchino Cataldo, who eventually became the last rais of the favignana tonnara.

Pulling up the Chamber of Death

Friends at Bue Marino on Favignana.

Favignana: Getting ready to set up I santi, the cross bearing the saints who watch over the tuna trap.

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Archives

sicilia

Stone Boudoir is now a Kindle-eBook

November 4, 2011

Tags: Stone Boudoir Kindle eBook Amazon Perseus

Click to buy. Lighten your luggage and take the Kindle-eBook edition on .your voyage
Just in time for the holidays! Stone Boudoir is now available on Kindle at Amazon.

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Reviews for "The Stone Boudoir"

"A compelling meditation on Sicilian culture." -- Kirkus Reviews

"A luminous (more…)

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Natalie Oana Russo needs your prayers

October 8, 2011

Tags: Natalie Oana Russo Mondello Hawaii Honolulu Jeannin Brigitte Sicily marrow transplant leukemia prayers

Jeannin Russo, Natalie Oana Russo and Brigitte Russo.
Natalie Oana Russo, of Hawai'i, whom I first met in Mondello in 1985, is recovering in Seattle from a bone marrow transplant performed on 20 September 2011. The transplant was successful but the next 100 days are critical. She has no immune system until her new cells generate healthy new white blood cells. Both her daughters, Jeannin, who just graduated law school, and Brigitte, a freshman at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, are with her in Seattle.
Please see her website at www.curenat.com

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Marettimo Excursion

February 24, 2011

Tags: Marettimo Egadi island blue sea Mediterranean Sandokan favignana outing sicily sicilia italy italia travel

In the summer of 2006, for the 20th anniversary of my first setting foot on Favignana, and of seeing my first mattanza, I brought my sisters and friends to stay at the house I rented at Bue Marino, while I was researching parts of Mattanza. We took a day trip to a sister island, Marettimo.



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Moffo and friend

February 24, 2011

Tags: Moffo Schimmenti Polizzi Generosa Pieta` Bassa Sicily Sicilia Italy stone boudoir

Moffo and friend, Pieta Bassa, Polizzi Generosa
Moffo and friend, Polizzi

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Mondello Lifeguards, end of 1986 season.

February 24, 2011

Tags: Photos sicily sicilia Theresa Maggio Foto Mondelo Palermo Piero Il cavaliere Corrao Toto` Podesta` Giuseppe Pino Lupo Locascio salvataggi lifegueards Charleston Lo stabilimento

Mondello: I Magnifici di 1986. Piero is bottom row, second from left, laughing. Pino "Lupo" LoCascio, left of him, used to be his scribe when Piero wanted to send me a letter.
My buddies the summer of 1986 when I lived in Mondello with Piero. This was the last day of the season, so they posed for me. I was doing a story about them for the monthly paper, Mondello Cultura e Sport, headed up by Michele LoMonaco, my Italian teacher.

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Quick Links

Mondello 1986
Slide show of my year in Via Terza Compagnia
Favignana tonnara
Slide show: Island life in the mid-1990s
Best of Sicily
A comprehensive site about Sicily and its culture.