Family Deceptions

Comparable in length to 455 pages. Pietro and Isabella Rocca are living a marriage of convenience in 1928 Italy. He allows his wife to rule the household, the farm, and their young twins. Isabella thinks she rules Pietro too, until she discovers him in bed with the neighbor's wife. Isabella sends him away, to work in Torino for the year it will take her anger to subside. Instead, he sails to America with hopes of acquiring enough money to buy his family's forgiveness. The new life Pietro builds—one based on gambling, extortion, bootlegging, and bigamy—seduces him to stay. Meanwhile in Italy, Isabella adjusts to life without Pietro, using deceit to safeguard her family and later to aid WWII partisans who eventually regard their son a hero and their daughter a Nazi collaborator. Twenty-nine years will pass before Pietro returns as a wealthy man, along with an American son determined to befriend the family his father deserted. But first, Pietro must redeem himself to Isabella, their children, and the neighbor he betrayed.
Fans of the family sagas by Howard Fast and the TV series, Boardwalk, will enjoy Family Deceptions.