The Italian Girl

After Rebecca Huntley's Italian nonna died, incredible stories about her life surfaced. Rebecca then realised her grandmother was muck more than the wonderful cook and kind-hearted lacemaker she had always known. Desperate to learn more, Rebecca seeks out the truth about her nonna - a search that takes her from the island of Elba off the Tuscan coast through the sugar cane fields of north Queensland and the internment camps of the Second World War to life in inner-city Sydney. Learning more about her nonna stirs up old ghosts in Rebecca's relationship with her mother and challenges RebeccaÆs own sense of self as she, pregnant with her first child, wonders what it really means to be a mother. Evocative and honest, this story of love, loss and identity always comes back to the question behind Rebecca's search: What does it mean to be an Italian girl in a changing world? Book jacket.