Kimberly Menozzi, Author
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Of Two Minds

27/4/2022

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I am always of two minds in regard to the United States. I both miss it terribly and am happy to be away from there, particularly when I see how things have gone there in the last six years or so (and I write this in 2022, to be clear).

Since I came to Italy to stay, eighteen years ago, I have lost a lot of my family in the US. My father and stepfather both passed away in 2009. My mother passed in 2017, my sister and grandmother in 2020, and my aunt in 2022. I have not been home since my mother’s passing, and that was the last time I saw anyone in my family. We talk occasionally on the phone; my brother and I have a standing appointment on the third Sunday of the month, with “extra” calls if something of importance happens.

Every now and again, however, I am hit with a blow of nostalgia and a longing for “home”, whatever that means anymore. It can come from watching a TV series that I remember watching with Mom, or a song that contains some indefinable something that connects me with a long-forgotten memory, or a film that touches on themes of loss and strikes me just so, causing me to burst into tears, aching for something that no longer even really exists.

July 2021 was my fiftieth birthday, and while I don’t really feel much different in the physical sense, on more emotional levels, I find myself changing immensely. All my memories of home have a different quality to them with the benefit of distance. I don’t fool myself into thinking that everything was ever perfect, once. I know better than that. But I do feel that nostalgia in a much different way, right down to my bones, it seems, and I honestly am in mourning for so much more in addition to the losses of my loved ones.

Even post-pandemic (can we really call it that, yet?), I still can’t imagine going “home”. What I see on the news and in the posts on social media tell me the US is more foreign to me than ever before. Frankly, even before I left, I often felt distinctly “other” for a lot of reasons.

More and more often I’m asked when I’ll come back to visit, and I never have an answer. I can joke about it, but the truth is, I just can’t say. I know I can’t wait for the “perfect” time, because there’s no such thing, and anything can happen in the meantime, without warning of any kind.
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That’s a lesson I’ve learned, believe me. At the same time, though, I don’t know when I’ll ever feel like I can be there without worry. I don’t know when I’ll be strong enough to face my fear of what has become an unsettling “unknown” in the time since I’ve been away. Nevertheless, I keep hoping, and even, very vaguely, planning, just in case. I look at the prices of flights, rental cars, hotel rooms. I plot journeys of all sorts, where I’d arrive, where I’d drive to, where I’d leave from. I even allow time for quarantine, just in case.


Just in case.
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An Update, At Last

1/10/2020

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It has been a long time since I’ve sat down to write. At least, to write anything longer than a comment or a short post on Facebook. The reason for this is, unfortunately, rather difficult to break down, but I’m going to try to do that, here.

If we’re not connected via FB or in real life, you likely won’t know what has been going on with me in the last few years. I’ll recap what some of you already know, first:

Around Christmas of 2014, I had plans to begin work/finalize what I had completed so far on a number of different works. I hoped to spend 2015 writing Davide’s back story (pre-Ask Me…, a la Alternate Rialto), and conclude a couple of new stories that I’d had bouncing around in my head at that time. But on the day after Christmas, I called my mother (as I did daily, during the week), and was given the news that she had been diagnosed with Leukemia. Naturally, all writing plans were put on hold, and I left for the US immediately, for what would become a nine-month stay, seeing her through her treatments and into her eventual remission.

After this experience, I was left drained and unfocused upon returning to Italy. I had lost my focus and writing no longer seemed as important as it once had. I felt guilt for leaving her alone (in spite of her remission status), and I struggled to get back into a writing frame of mind. I’m told this is normal for people who are caregivers, and I thought I could “ride out” this setback, focusing instead on my cycling and my general health.

2016 passed, and I was cycling more and more, feeling better than ever, and I spent the summer with my mother, ending the season with helping her clean her house in Tennessee, so she could sell it and live full-time in Florida, closer to her mother and brother, and to the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, where she continued to get treatment/checkups for her leukemia. The house sold in just shy of two weeks, and her final move was accomplished after I’d returned to Italy once again.

In December, I completed one of my longest bike rides yet, but got the ‘flu just after Christmas. My phone calls with Mom had continued, and she had been talking about feeling tired, and pressing on because maybe it was just the holiday madness wearing on her.

It wasn’t. The first week of January, 2017, found her back at Moffitt, with her leukemia back in full force. She died just a couple of days later, on the night before I was able to go back to the US. I flew home, Alessandro next to me, rushing every step of the way, even though there was no point in hurrying.

She was gone.

My uncle, Don, and my sister, Lisa, dealt with the arrangements for the memorial service the day after I arrived in Florida. Jet-lagged and grieving, I was in no condition to do anything.
Alle and I stayed in her condominium for the next month, trying to gather her things together, trying to assist my uncle where we could, and trying to make sense of what had happened. Nothing worked. Nothing made sense. She was gone and she wasn’t coming back.

In February, we came home, still dazed by the loss. Eventually, I understood that I wasn’t coping. At all. By April or May (I honestly don’t recall which), I told Alle I needed to speak to someone. I needed help, because I felt broken and nothing was coming together at all for me. I just didn’t care about anything outside of my pain, and I couldn’t stop hurting.

I began therapy and was prescribed anti-depressants. They helped, quite a lot. In time I was able to get out of bed, to function (at least a little) and I eventually wanted to do things. Vague notions of writing returned, but didn’t solidify into anything workable.

It was still a long slog, still overwhelming at times, and over the next three years, I didn’t go back to the US. I was still depressed, but I was functioning (somewhat). I spoke to my therapist at regular intervals, made some progress, and come January of 2020, I thought I might make a visit to the US in March after all.  In mid-February,  I had a Skype call with my sister, which went great, as we had made strides  in repairing our slightly strained relationship via  another call a few months prior. I truly missed my family, and now I thought I could carve out a trip that would go from Florida to Kentucky and back again, to get in touch with everyone.

That didn’t happen, of course. By the end of February, thanks to COVID-19, all of Italy was on lockdown, which, amazingly, didn’t bother me as much as it could have. The time spent with my hubby went well, and we enjoyed each other’s company in spite of the general anxiety surrounding us. We did what we could to navigate this strange and frightening event, relying on each other for strength.

Mid-March, however, the whole world was in chaos, and I had another personal blow. My sister passed away suddenly, just a day or two before all of Florida went on lockdown. I couldn’t go home, even if I’d wanted to. I mourned from afar, shocked and stunned by this unexpected loss. It was all too unreal – too much of a bad dream to have actually happened, and yet, it had. I was angry – the first time I’d ever reacted to a death in this way – because of the sense I’d been cheated out of something, and at the time we’d wasted in the meanwhile.

The months passed faster than I would have ever dreamed they could, and slower than I’d ever imagined possible. I had bouts of sadness and nostalgia, and moments of quiet appreciation for the things I still had, and for those I’d lost.

July rolled around, still not as hot or unpleasant as usual, with my birthday on the 13th. My brother wrote me and asked me to call him on the 12th, but I wasn’t able to. On the 13th, my uncle, asked me to call him. I knew this wasn’t good news. I knew what it would be.

My grandmother had passed away on the 12th. Another loss, yet not as shocking, as she’d been sick for a while and her 93rd birthday was a few days after mine. Still, I had no desire to celebrate, and once again, unable to go home and mourn with my family, I endured this loss from afar.

Which brings us up to now. As I write this it is the beginning  of October, 2020, and still, nothing seems settled. I watch the ongoing chaos in the US with a heavy heart, always wondering what my mother, sister and grandmother would make of all that is happening. I miss them all so much, and wish I could have said a proper goodbye to each one of them.

Sometimes, I know, we are denied that. Every loss since I’ve been here has been a goodbye over the phone. The final embraces were just that, even though we didn’t know it at the time. I know I’m not the only one who has lost someone – especially this year. This year has been surreal and painful for most of us, and I don’t think I’ve known anyone who hasn’t had to confront this sort of pain.
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As for myself, I’ve had the wind knocked out of my sails for some time now, and I’ve lingered in the doldrums longer than I ever have before. I hope to get back on my metaphorical feet  and share my stories again, but I may be some time. I beg your patience in the meantime.
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Both Near and Far - August 24th, 2016

24/8/2016

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I woke up this morning during my annual holiday in the US to find a message in my inbox, already several hours old. A friend, in England, asking if my husband and I were okay. He'd heard about the earthquake in Italy, he said, and he wanted to check in on us.

My stomach slowly rolled over, and I found other emails asking the same thing - notices that friends had queried on my Facebook wall to see if my husband and I were all right, do we live close to the epicenter?

With quiet dread, we checked the news online. I know he felt the same way I did; afraid that we would learn another earthquake had occurred in Emilia-Romagna, only, perhaps this time even closer to home. Frightened that we would have reason to worry about our loved ones while we were thousands of miles away, unable to do anything about the situtation unfolding back home.

We soon found that the quake has hit the region of Umbria, also close to Marche, Abruzzo and Lazio, in the very center of Italy, where the structures are ancient and unlikely to withstand a shallow, 6.8 magnitude quake. And so, the devastation is rather far from our home, but the impact of the event will certainly be felt by the entire country in so many ways.

I'm sad to say, my first response to this was an immediate sort of relief. Upon reading the location of the epicenter, my heart calmed and my stomach stopped turning. My family and my home in Italy were safe, it seemed.

I then felt guilty for thinking this, particularly when I saw photos of the damage and the rising death toll listed on successive articles about the disaster. The number keeps growing as the reports come in, and we see this quake has more than a few echoes of the quake in L'Aquila in 2009, as well as those in Mirandola in 2012, all of them having occurred in the middle of the night while most people slept, and a handful of people worked in the wee hours of the morning. The loss of life and livelihood comes seemingly out of nowhere - but then, doesn't it always?

And as I read, I continue to consider those who don't have the luxury I did, for a few minutes on a Wednesday morning in the US, of knowing their family is, for the moment, safe at home.

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If you would like to help out by donating money to areas hit by this morning's earthquake, please go to the website for Croce Rossa Italiana for more information.

https://www.cri.it/terremoto-centro-italia

​http://www.ifrc.org/en/news-and-media/news-stories/europe-central-asia/italy/red-cross-rescuers-join-hunt-for-quake-survivors--72458/
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Wordless Wednesday

11/5/2016

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Throwback Thursday!

7/4/2016

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The hubby and me, in Pisa, Italy in 2006.
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Thursday Thirteen - 13 Series I'm Hooked On!

31/3/2016

5 Comments

 
Ciao a tutti! Hi, everybody! It's me again, after some time away, and this week, I thought I'd share some of my TV addiction with you. You see, I don't really watch a lot of TV, for the most part, but since Netflix came to Italy last November...? I still don't watch a *lot* of TV, but my hubby and I have found ourselves hooked on a few shows in particular. Some are ongoing, some are over now, sadly, and others have us on tenterhooks, eagerly waiting for more episodes to arrive on Netflix Italy.

So, in the spirit of "sharing is caring" I thought I'd share with you:

13 Series I'm Hooked On!

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1) First and foremost comes Jessica Jones, the entire reason we got Netflix in the first place, so we could watch this series, featuring David Tennant as the reprehensibly creepy villain, Kilgrave. We were won over immediately by every other aspect and character of the show.
2) Next came the highly recommended Daredevil, which we compulsively watched, episode after episode, ending the entire first series in a matter of days, really. We did the same with the second season, only much faster.
3) I opted to try Call the Midwife after reading about it online and seeing it recommended as a solid choice for viewers wanting compellingly-written, realistic and heartfelt female characters. Which isn't to say the male characters aren't also well-rounded and human, too. We've exhausted the episodes available so far on Netflix Italia, and are impatiently awaiting the resumption of our regular viewing of this classy, emotional drama.
4) The hubby and I binge-watched Season 1 of Broadchurch to prepare for the second season (he hadn't seen Season 2, but I had), and now, two episodes in, we're glad we did. Gritty, intense, and so full of twists and turns it was difficult to solve the mystery ahead of the characters, and it brought me to tears even on a second viewing. Fantastic television.
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5) On a lighter note, we decided we needed to lighten things up a little, and after having seen the previews while I was in the US, I suggested giving Grace and Frankie a try. Hilarious and bittersweet, this series was yet another that seemed to go by in a flash thanks to our compulsive viewing (two episodes at a time - at least)!
6) While a number of people have panned Master of None, it's a show I enjoyed from start to finish - and so did the hubby. I find Aziz Ansari funny, indeed, and hey, that's just the way my mind works! What can I say?
7) Okay, look, I know New Girl has been on for a while, but I just never bothered to give it a go. Netflix allowed us to check it out and giggle insanely every time we watch it. So, I reckon that's in the "win" column, right?
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8) Luther. Now this show is the very definition of addiction. On the first viewing of the first episode, the hubby and I looked at each other and said "Next episode, NOW!" Being a BBC series, there are few episodes, but they're all like films of high quality on every level. 

Also, Idris Elba. Do I really need to say anything more? Really?
9) When we needed something light and fluffy - but still reasonably substantial - to enjoy, we sat back and enjoyed the Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Silly, sweet, and worth your time if you enjoy fish out of water stories. And that catchy theme song? Dammit!
10) Archer is one of my guilty little pleasures. I watch this one on my own when hubby watches football matches (that's soccer to the Americans out there) with his buddies. It's quick, sharp and a brilliant parody of spy films, and I just loooove H. Jon Benjamin's voice. (I never knew what he looked like until I saw him in Master of None!)
11) I've finally gotten to introduce the hubby to ​That '70s Show - thanks, Netflix! - and luckily he's enjoying it, too. While the show went downhill fast after Topher Grace left (in my humble opinion) the first few seasons were a hilarious trip down memory lane for me. Sort of. I don't remember a lot of the 1970s, but I know they got a lot of details right in this sitcom. And I love Eric's parents, Red and Kitty. LOVE them!
12) So far, this series is NOT on Netflix Italia - I don't know if it's on Netflix in the US, either - but I really wish I could watch Bob's Burgers here! I plan on binge-viewing it when I'm in the US this summer, in hopes of getting it out of my system. Alas, I suspect the presence of H. Jon Benjamin's voice will only call me back yet again.
13) And, finally, another current and ongoing series which also isn't on Netflix, but I've gotten hooked on it, partly thanks to my mother, and partly due to the fact the show is based on/inspired by characters created by Neil Gaiman. Lucifer is sexy, funny and engaging - if only for Tom Ellis' performance as the titular character. Love him, love the show - although I do prefer the character having more supernatural qualities as he did at the start of the series. Here's hoping he'll get back to being a naughty, naughty boy again soon!



So, there you have them! 13 Series I've Gotten Hooked On!













Do we have any in common? Let me know in the comments!


















And, in the meantime...

















Let's enjoy a little mischeviousness from our favorite fallen angel, eh?











I mean...














Look at those puppy dog eyes! ;)
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Ciao for now!
5 Comments

Wordless Wednesday

16/3/2016

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Wordless Wednesday

9/3/2016

2 Comments

 
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Venetian mask shop, May, 2006
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Throwback Thursday

3/3/2016

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Me in my Easter finest, 197?
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Thursday Thirteen: Thirteen Books in my TBR Pile

25/2/2016

16 Comments

 
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Ciao a tutti! Hi, everybody! I'm back again for Thursday Thirteen, and this week, I'm keeping it simple by sharing something we can all identify with: that stack of books (or the bookshelf, in some cases) yet to be investigated at length.

Let's jump in and see what we have in common, shall we?

Thirteen Books in my To Be Read Pile!

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Trigger Warning explores the masks we all wear and the people we are beneath them to reveal our vulnerabilities and our truest selves. Here is a rich cornucopia of horror and ghosts stories, science fiction and fairy tales, fabulism and poetry that explore the realm of experience and emotion. In Adventure Story—a thematic companion to The Ocean at the End of the Lane—Gaiman ponders death and the way people take their stories with them when they die. His social media experience A Calendar of Tales are short takes inspired by replies to fan tweets about the months of the year—stories of pirates and the March winds, an igloo made of books, and a Mother’s Day card that portends disturbances in the universe. Gaiman offers his own ingenious spin on Sherlock Holmes in his award-nominated mystery tale The Case of Death and Honey. And Click-Clack the Rattlebag explains the creaks and clatter we hear when we’re all alone in the darkness.
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Sex is forbidden at the Dasgupta Institute. So what is the sparkling, magnetically attractive Beth Marriot doing here? Beth is fighting demons: a catastrophic series of events has undermined all prospect of happiness. Trauma leaves her no alternative but to bury herself in the austere asceticism of a community that wakes at 4am, doesn't permit eye contact, let alone speech, and keeps men and women strictly segregated. But the curious self dies hard. Conflicted and wayward, Beth stumbles on a diary and cannot keep away from it, or the man who wrote it. Originally published with the title The Server
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In the frigid pre-dawn hours, in a distressed Midwestern city, desperate unemployed folks are lined up for a spot at a job fair. Without warning, a lone driver plows through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes, running over the innocent, backing up, and charging again. Eight people are killed; fifteen are wounded. The killer escapes. In another part of town, months later, a retired cop named Bill Hodges is still haunted by the unsolved crime. When he gets a crazed letter from someone who self-identifies as the “perk” and threatens an even more diabolical attack, Hodges wakes up from his depressed and vacant retirement, hell-bent on preventing another tragedy. Brady Hartsfield lives with his alcoholic mother in the house where he was born. He loved the feel of death under the wheels of the Mercedes, and he wants that rush again. Only Bill Hodges, with two new, unusual allies, can apprehend the killer before he strikes again. And they have no time to lose, because Brady’s next mission, if it succeeds, will kill or maim thousands.
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Rattle of Want ranges from brilliant brief experiments (such as Abbreviated Glossary and Appendages) to a novella-in-flash (The Old Road) for the canon in that new genre. Altogether these stories mine the wants and desires in the breakups of families, rebellions of youth, and occasional ascents of the spirit. Often they beautifully, and simply, nail a place, as in Small Town (a perfect evocation of the title), report an impending explosion, as in Kindling (a quintessential flash), or capture a character (if you haven’t met Blusterfuck … do so at your own peril). Few writers can do all that Gay Degani does.
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...Presented here as a guide--and a warning--to aspiring racers who dream of joining the professional racing circus, Phil's adventures in road rash serve as a hilarious and cautionary tale of frustrating team directors and broken promises. Phil's education in the ways of the peloton, his discouraging negotiations for a better contract, his endless miles crisscrossing America in pursuit of race wins, and his conviction that somewhere just around the corner lies the ticket to the big time fuel this tale of hope and ambition from one of cycling's best story-tellers. Pro Cycling on $10 a Day chronicles the racer's daily lot of blood-soaked bandages, sleazy motels, cheap food, and overflowing toilets. But it also celebrates the true beauty of the sport and the worth of the journey, proving in the end that even among the narrow ranks of world-class professional cycling, there will always be room for a hard-working outsider.
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Rock star, crowdfunding pioneer, and TED speaker Amanda Palmer knows all about asking. Performing as a living statue in a wedding dress, she wordlessly asked thousands of passersby for their dollars. When she became a singer, songwriter, and musician, she was not afraid to ask her audience to support her as she surfed the crowd (and slept on their couches while touring). And when she left her record label to strike out on her own, she asked her fans to support her in making an album, leading to the world's most successful music Kickstarter. Even while Amanda is both celebrated and attacked for her fearlessness in asking for help, she finds that there are important things she cannot ask for-as a musician, as a friend, and as a wife. She learns that she isn't alone in this, that so many people are afraid to ask for help, and it paralyzes their lives and relationships. In this groundbreaking book, she explores these barriers in her own life and in the lives of those around her, and discovers the emotional, philosophical, and practical aspects of THE ART OF ASKING. Part manifesto, part revelation, this is the story of an artist struggling with the new rules of exchange in the twenty-first century, both on and off the Internet. THE ART OF ASKING will inspire readers to rethink their own ideas about asking, giving, art, and love.
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Family, that slippery word, a star to every wandering bark, and everyone sailing under a different sky. After his mother's death, Richard, a newly remarried hospital consultant, decides to build bridges with his estranged sister, inviting Angela and her family for a week in a rented house on the Welsh border. Four adults and four children, a single family and all of them strangers. Seven days of shared meals, log fires, card games and wet walks. But in the quiet and stillness of the valley, ghosts begin to rise up. The parents Richard thought he had. The parents Angela thought she had. Past and present lovers. Friends, enemies, victims, saviours. And watching over all of them from high on the dark hill, Karen, Angela's stillborn daughter. The Red House is about the extraordinariness of the ordinary, weaving the words and thoughts of the eight characters together with those fainter, stranger voices - of books and letters and music, of the dead who once inhabited these rooms, of the ageing house itself and the landscape in which it sits.
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Look at the Birdie is a collection of fourteen short stories from one of the most original writers in American fiction. This series of perfectly rendered vignettes, never before published in Kurt Vonnegut’s lifetime, reveals a warm, wise, and funny portrait of life in post–World War II America—a world where squabbling couples, high school geniuses, misfit office workers, and small-town lotharios struggle to adapt to changing technology, moral ambiguity, and unprecedented affluence. Featuring a Foreword by author and longtime Vonnegut confidant Sidney Offit, Look at the Birdie is an unexpected gift for readers who thought that Vonnegut’s voice had been stilled forever—and serves as a terrific introduction to his short fiction for anyone who has yet to experience his genius.
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Set in a small-town North Carolina amusement park in 1973, Joyland tells the story of the summer in which college student Devin Jones comes to work as a carny and confronts the legacy of a vicious murder, the fate of a dying child, and the ways both will change his life forever.
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With this wise, tender, and deeply funny novel, Marina Lewycka takes her place alongside Zadie Smith and Monica Ali as a writer who can capture the unchanging verities of family. When an elderly and newly widowed Ukrainian immigrant announces his intention to remarry, his daughters must set aside their longtime feud to thwart him. For their father’s intended is a voluptuous old-country gold digger with a proclivity for green satin underwear and an appetite for the good life of the West. As the hostilities mount and family secrets spill out, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian combines sex, bitchiness, wit, and genuine warmth in its celebration of the pleasure of growing old disgracefully.
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'In eighteenth-century France there lived a man who was one of the most gifted and abominable personages in an era that knew no lack of gifted and abominable personages. His name was Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, and if his name has been forgotten today, it is certainly not because Grenouille fell short of those more famous blackguards when it came to arrogance, misanthropy, immorality, or, more succinctly, wickedness, but because his gifts and his sole ambition were restricted to a domain that leaves no traces in history: to the fleeting realm of scent . . .'
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Neverwhere is the story of Richard Mayhew, a young London businessman with a good heart and an ordinary life, which is changed forever when he discovers a girl bleeding on the sidewalk. He stops to help her—an act of kindness that plunges him into a world he never dreamed existed. Slipping through the cracks of reality, Richard lands in the Neverwhere—a London of shadows and darkness, monsters and saints, murderers and angels that exists entirely in a subterranean labyrinth. The Neverwhere is home to Door, the mysterious girl Richard helped in the London Above. Door, a noblewoman whose family has been murdered, is on a quest to find the agent that slaughtered her family and thwart the destruction of this underworld kingdom. If Richard is ever to return to his former life, he must join the journey to save Door's world—and find a way to survive.
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Allison Weiss is a typical working mother, trying to balance a business, ageing parents, a demanding daughter and a marriage. But when the website she develops becomes a huge success, she finds herself challenged to the point of being completely overwhelmed. As she struggles to hold her life together and meet the needs of all the people around her, Allison finds that the painkillers she was prescribed for a back injury help her deal with more than just physical discomfort - they make her feel calm and get her through the increasingly hectic days. Sure, she worries that the bottles seem to empty a bit faster each week, but it's not like she's some Hollywood starlet partying all night. It's not as if she has an actual problem. Until she ends up in a world she never thought she'd experience outside of a movie theatre: rehab. And as Allison struggles to get her life back on track, she learns a few life lessons along the way.





​And there you have them - Thirteen Books on my TBR Pile!


Do we have any in common? Let me know in the comments, eh?




Do you have any suggestions for titles I should add? Let me know those, too!











Because you know, I'm nothing if not a bookworm.










The only thing I need now?















​
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Someone to read them with, of course!
Ciao for now!
16 Comments

Throwback Thursday

18/2/2016

0 Comments

 
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Me and Dad, Christmas 197?
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Wordless Wednesday

17/2/2016

0 Comments

 
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Bike path, near Puianello, Italy, November, 2015.
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Thursday Thirteen - 13 Photos from 2015

11/2/2016

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Ciao a tutti! Hi, everybody! It's me! I'm back - and I'm freezing! We woke up this morning to find out that the radiators weren't working (we had some power issues last night which seems to have caused the problem) and so, I'm gonna knock out this TT real quick - and then dive back into bed for the morning, at least. ;)

So, without further ado, please have a look at these

Thirteen Photos from 2015

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The hybrid bike my mother and uncle arranged for me to ride while I was in the US helping her through her leukaemia treatment last year.
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Crack of dawn at Moffitt Cancer Center.
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My grandmother's kitties - Sammy (RIP) and Jersey - grab a nap.
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Me, during my first ride in full lycra! Woot!
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Treasure Island Beach, Saint Petersburg, FL, 8:30 a.m., July, 2015
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Me, with my first road bike in 20-something years!
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There's a turtle in this photo. Can you find it? :)
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That's a snail shell, the size of your fist! Welcome to Florida, y'all!
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Storm clouds approach St Petersburg, FL.
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Back in Italy again. Chiesa di Albinea in the distance.
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Chiesa di Albinea again, from another angle, one month later.
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My hubby, ever the gentleman, rinses off a rock for me in the Secchia river, close to the restaurant his auntie and cousins run.
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Photo taken during a short break on my longest ride of 2015 (41.5 miles!), just outside of Fosdondo, Italy.
And there you have them: 13 Photos from 2015! I hope you've enjoyed them.


As you saw, it was quite a year, for me. I'm getting back into the swing of things, slowly but surely, now.





Of course, it's still winter here, and I'm quite chilly without the heat on, so I'm off to cuddle under the covers, read and hope the kitty will keep me company between my cups of tea.






But remember, the best way to stay warm is to keep active.









And, with that in mind...

















Hockey, anyone?

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Ciao for now!
0 Comments

Wordless Wednesday

10/2/2016

0 Comments

 
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Piazza Prampolini, Reggio Emilia, Italy, December 2015
0 Comments

Wordless Wednesday

3/2/2016

0 Comments

 
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July, 2015
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    Kimberly Menozzi

    Author. Happily Married. Survivor of life with two deranged kitties.

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