Tuesday, March 01, 2011

Dolci Di Love

By Sarah-Kate Lynch
HarperCollins, $39.99
Reviewed by Nicky Pellegrino

Ancient Italian women dressed in black provided NZ writer Sarah-Kate Lynch with the inspiration for her seventh novel. On a research trip to Tuscany she noticed them everywhere she went and found herself wondering, what if all these old ladies were in cahoots?

And so began Dolci Di Love, a story about a secret league of Italian widows dedicated to healing broken hearts and smoothing the path of true love. When American businesswoman Lily Turner arrives in their picturesque hilltop town her heart is well and truly broken. She’s discovered her husband has a secret family in Italy and is there to track him down. Haunted by her childlessness and devastated by failed bids at IVF and adoption, Lily is an emotional wreck. This doesn’t escape the notice of the secret network of widows who are determined to find her a happy ending. Before too long – and with many comic moments - they’ve manipulated her into helping them bake the town’s famous biscotti and are throwing her into the path of a handsome local widower.

Fertility battles and farce (at one point a tiramisu talks!) might not seem a natural match but, as Lynch has proved in previous novels, she has a deft hand when it comes to blending serious issues and comedy. Fans of her bestsellers are not going to be disappointed by Dolci Di Love. I think it’s going to tick all their boxes – it’s entertaining, emotionally truthful, has a beautiful setting, delicious biscotti and a satisfying ending.

At this point I should admit that I’ve known Sarah-Kate Lynch for a couple of decades – in fact she smoothed my own path to true love! It can be tricky reading a friend’s novel because you worry about hearing their voice in your head and not being able to lose yourself fully in the story. That never happened with Dolci Di Love. From the very first page, where Lily finds a laminated photograph of her husband with his mistress and two children hidden under the insole of his left golf shoe, I’d forgotten about Sarah-Kate entirely and was hooked into her bittersweet tale.

Footnote:


Nicky Pellegrino is a succcesful Auckland-based author of popular fiction and her new novel The Villa Girls - Orion - is being published in April this year. She is also the Books Editor of the Herald on Sunday where the above review was first published on 27 February, 2011.
Pellegrino has just set up a website.


The following Booklover piece was also published in that issue of the Herald on Sunday.

Booklover
Counter tenor William Purefoy sings the role of Arsamene in the NBR New Zealand Opera’s production of Xerxes, opening in Auckland on Wednesday 2 March. http://www.nzopera.com/

The book I love most is... The House at Pooh Corner by A A Milne

This was the first book I ever read and I’ve read it many times now, including out loud to my wife and children. I’m always amazed at the way in which it’s written on so many levels for everyone to enjoy, with fabulous phrases like “he fell into a bit of the forest that had been left out by mistake”.

The book I'm reading right now is... A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon. Everyone told me how great The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time was and so just to be contrary I’ve decided to start with another of his books. It's early days yet...

The book I'd like to read next is... The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. I want to have a bash at the Larsson trilogy to see what all the fuss is about but also because my wife went to see the first film without having read the book and was so shocked and appalled that she got me intrigued!

The book that changed me is... The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
My daughter was so enthusiastic about this book that I just had to read it and she was right. I think it’s beautifully written with one of the most amazing conceits of any story. A book that can reduce a grown man to tears on an aeroplane having previously made him laugh out loud has got to have something going for it. I love it when a writer consistently conjures up turns of phrase every five pages or so that make me stop and think “wow”.

The book I wish I'd never read is... The Island Of The Day Before by Umberto Eco. This book just made me cross. It is such a lovely idea but is so unbelievably slow and laborious that I simply had to give up, despite having soldiered on for about three quarters of it. I understand that Umberto Eco once said that it was his personal aim to write a book that was unfinishable for the reader. Job done in my opinion!

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