La Brigantessa by Rosanna Micelotta Battigelli
A Throwback Thursday Review from 2019
Rosanna Micelotta Battigelli’s ambitious debut novel, La Brigantessa has already garnered awards and nominations, such as the Winner of the IPPY Gold Medal for Historical Fiction and Finalist for the 2019 Fred Kerner Book Award. No doubt more recognition will come for her and La Brigantessa.
The historical background of this engrossing book is General Garibaldi’s campaign against Rome that led to his wounding and imprisonment after being defeated in the Calabrian mountains of the Aspromonte in 1862. The small peasant village of Camini is where we find our heroine, Gabriella Falcone and her admirer, Tonino. The church lands have just been acquired by a wealthy landowner from the north, Alfonso Fantin, a lecherous and immoral man into whose hands the future of the peasants now lies. Upon arriving in Camini to inspect his latest purchase, he is immediately attracted to Gabriella and has set his eyes on her with bad intent. What transpires next is getting into spoiler territory, but it results in Gabriella and the priest Don Simone fleeing Camini and soon falling into the band of brigands headed by Stefano Galante. Stefano, like all the brigands in the Aspromonte, all have a reason for evading the law, and Stefano is no different. The question remains: what will he do with the two captured villagers, one a priest, the other a beautiful peasant girl? Will Gabriella become a brigantessa to stay alive? Will she ever see Tonino again, who has joined Garibaldi’s “red shirt” army?
La Brigantessa is a novel that fans of the historical fiction genre will definitely enjoy. It contains adventure, suspense, murder, and battle scenes that fill the 300 + pages of this book. However, I found, at times, the details detracted from the story and I glossed over them to get to the next scene. Some things have to be left to the reader’s imagination! The true strengths of this book lie in the descriptions of Italian peasant life at the time and the wilderness of the Calabrian mountains. Bands of brigands lied in wait to pillage and plunder from wealthy travellers along the rugged paths and trails of the Aspromonte.
*
“This is a beautiful novel, one that vividly recreates the heartbreak and drama of one of the most turbulent periods in Italian history.” —Nino Ricci, award-winning author of The Origins of Species, Testament, and Sleep.
About the Author
Rosanna Micelotta Battigelli was born in Italy and immigrated to Canada with her family at three years of age. Rosanna started teaching children from Kindergarten to Grade 8 in both the English and French Immersion sectors in 1981, and has four provincial Best Practice Teaching Awards in recognition of her early literacy strategies and other initiatives. An alumna of the Humber School for Writers, her fiction has appeared in a dozen Canadian anthologies, including Mamma Mia: Good Italian Girls Talk Back (2004) and A Second Coming: Canadian Migration Fiction (2016). Since retiring from teaching in June 2015, Rosanna is pursuing her literary goals full-time. La Brigantessa is her debut novel. She lives in Sudbury, Ontario.
Book Details
Printed copy: 978-1-77133-553-9
Accessible ePub: 978-1-77133-554-6
PDF: 978-1-77133-556-0
378 Pages
Inanna Publications, October 25, 2018