Tag Archive | Jo Piazza

The Sicilian Inheritance by Jo Piazza

Apr5

Intertwining Lives

The Sicilian Inheritance by Jo Piazza is an enthralling dual timeline novel that I just could not put down.

The action is set in present day and from 1908-1925. We begin in America and travel to Sicily in present day and backwards through the years as a character searches for the truth as to what happened to her Great Grandmother. Stories have traveled down the years. But what is the truth? We all need to know where we come from.

This is a book about the roles of women. In both time periods, men like to think they are in charge as they bully those around them… but the women have a tough inner core, and prove to be resourceful.

As we, and a character in present day, uncover the Great Grandmother’s story, we find a woman ahead of her times. She is very intelligent and has been held back by the conventions of the time. Women, with knowledge about medicinal herbs, were often seen as witches and shunned. They were, in fact, healers and often proved to be life-savers to those who came to them for help.

Continue reading →

You Were Always Mine by Christine Pride & Jo Piazza

Jul20

Fiercely Protective

You Were Always Mine by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza is a really powerful, contemporary novel that consumed me from the start.

Once again, the two authors have produced a marvellous novel, after their fabulous debut book We Are Not Like Them.

Where to begin?… I loved so much about this book it is hard to know what to discuss first. This is a book about love, social injustice, racism, prejudice and pre-conceived ideas leading to judgement.

Cinnamon, the leading lady, is very likable. She is a product of the school of hard knocks but is an over-comer. She was brought up in the social care system which failed her on every level. She saw close up just what was wrong with the system. Now an adult, she is determined to change the system from within, determined that no child in her care will ever feel unwanted.

As an African American woman, Cinnamon has been a victim of both open, and convert racism. “ ‘You know, Cinnamon, you’re the first coloured friend I have ever had’, with the proudest look on her face like she’d earned the hardest Girl Scout badge.” The reader’s heart just weeps.

To see a black woman with a white baby, American society assumes she is the nanny. To see a black man with a white baby, American society assumes he is an abductor. But to see a white couple with a black baby, American society applauds. Clearly something seriously needs to change.

Continue reading →

We Are Not Like Them by Christine Pride And Jo Piazza

Oct11

So Powerful

We Are Not Like Them by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza is a powerful and heartbreaking contemporary story. If you only read one book this year – make sure it is We Are Not Like Them.

This is a book about friendship. This is a book about lives. This is a book about racial injustice. It is racial injustice that African Americans face every day of their lives. It is heartbreaking and it needs to change.

The book is about a friendship between two girls who grew up together – one black and one white. They were inseparable. “Sometimes you just need to be around someone who loved you before you were a fully formed person.” Their friendship is strong – until the day it is tested to the limits.

Being a young black man in America is dangerous. The novel explores the horrors that are faced daily.

The opening of the novel is shocking and heartbreaking. It sets the tone for what is to come.

It is awful to see people still being judged by the colour of their skin. “My good grades don’t matter… how faithful I was, how kind, none of it could ever erase the fact that people were going to hate me.” This is wrong. This has always been wrong. When will we learn to love people for who they are?

The authors reinforce the message that racial prejudice has never gone away as we hear of a terrible lynching fifty years earlier. “They just keep killing us” is a heartbreaking cry of a grandmother.

Continue reading →