I loved this book. Very much a story of two halves. In the first Stella is, despite the almost deaths and the hardships of her background, strong, beautiful and the flame around which the moths dance. In the second, her life is very different. It's a quirky, enchanting, sometimes amusing and sometimes depressing, distressing tale that I found impossible to put down. Original and beautifully written. I've recommended far and wide.

I enjoyed this book although it was slow to start it picked up pace and the characters were well drawn and interesting

Mariastella is the first child of Antonio and Assunta, who are raising a family in the Italian village of Ievoli. Mariastella dies as a baby – and the next child is her namesake, Mariastella or Stella.

Stella Fortuna has many escapes from death, bangs to the head, choking, an escape from drowning to name a few. Is she haunted by a jealous sister Mariastella, or plagued by the jealousy of her living sister Tina?

A story of family, Italy and America, immigration, male dominance, and female submission.

I found this an enjoyable read, more compelling the further I read, with well defined characters and believable narrative. Recommended.

I love the quote by Erin Kelly "You don't read this book - you live it" because it is so true, the story wraps around you and consumes you until you feel you're a part of the family.

Without taking copious notes as I read the book, I won't even attempt to mention all the characters in this book. There are many and all with Italian names, they're not names I could recall from memory.

It's a very dark tale pretty much most of the way through. Stella's father Antonio, later referred to as Tony is a bully, his attitude towards women, especially his wife Assunta and Stella is harsh - very. He has no respect for either of them and the culture seemed to be that of ownership. As such, there are some violent and upsetting scenes in the book, therefore perhaps this book might not be for everyone.

The first half of the book starts out in the very early 1900's shortly after the turn of the century and just before the first World War. Assunta is a very young girl living in the mountains of Calabria, Italy and is only 14 when she marries Antonio. There's no romance, its more a marriage of convenience because that's what women do in this small village - marry for financial security and to have children. Unfortunately Antonio doesn't take his responsibilities for Assunta all that seriously and pretty much abandons her to bring up their children alone, living with her mother in a tiny village scraping together a living from the land.

I enjoyed the first half very much. Even though they lived a harsh life and struggled to gather enough food to thrive, compared to the second half of the book the family were at least on the whole relatively free of the control of Antonio.

When Antonio came back from the first World War he only stayed around for a short time before moving on to find work in America. He would pay them a visit a couple of times but only to cause trouble and to leave Assunta pregnant yet again. In the second half he sent visa's for his wife and children to move over to America. By this point Stella was a young woman and despite the fact that she was determined not to marry or to have children, it was the done thing in their culture and her Father would make sure she married whether she wanted to or not.

This is a long family saga with Stella and her sister Tina (Concettina, but that wasn't very American so her Father shortened her name) as the main central characters. Stella had seen so much at such a young age it was little wonder she was determined not to marry and was fearful of having children. I especially enjoyed the way the story was told in a chronological and linear way. There is no jumping back and forth in time. This would have made it difficult to have followed the book as there are so many members of the family, it would have been impossible to keep up with them all, so in this respect there really wasn't a better way to write it.

It was a fascinating story which I really enjoyed. The many near death experiences of Stella made for compelling reading and it often seemed a miracle that she survived them. A story of very strong women, survivors who can certainly prove the adage "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger".

An excellent book, whose characters I have genuinely missed since I finished it.

A hard, pull no punches, story of life for two small girls growing up in the 1920s Italian mountains and then in 1939 America. You can imagine America through their eyes. They have no English and a very limited Italian vocabulary.

This is an amazing story, slow to start with but a story i would love to read over and over again.

This is an epic saga of an Italian American family, starting from their roots in a poor hillside village. The family and some of the events are quite extraordinary so that one wonders if they are even plausible. The effects of two world wars on everyone are long-lasting. However, the most significant impact comes from the Italian men and their relationships with all women - mothers, wives, daughters and grand-daughters.

At times the story moves along slowly so that it necessary to persevere. Worth reading.

This book was not for me. I struggled to get into the book or engage with the characters in any meaningful way. Others may like it but I gave up.

Stella Fortuna’s name means lucky star ,she doesn’t consider herself to be so and after reading this book neither will you. Her own mother is convinced she’s cursed and Stella believes her dead older sister who name she shares is haunting her. Life is hard for the family who live in abject poverty in the Calabrian hills . Antonio her father leaves for America soon after Stella’s birth ,he returns periodically to abuses his wife and growing family .Various strange life threatening events befall Stella both in Italy and in America where the whole family finally emigrate to on the eve of the war in Europe.
The reader ,and Stella ,hope that life will now improve, but in the tight knit Italian American community the expectations prove the same - women are valued only as wives and mother and as the property of a man . The last part of the novel deals with the reason behind Stella’s hatred of her previously beloved younger sister and is shocking but not particularly surprising given what we’ve learned of their lives so far.
The story is slow to start but soon gathers pace and becomes compelling reading. It is an exploration of the role of women in rural Italy and then in immigrant communities that is dark and bleak in places .

This was a fantastic read- from start to finish.

It reminded me a lot of Marquez's A Hundred Years of Solitude from time to time although the magical realism in this one wasn't as dominant.

This is the story of an Italian American immigrant family through the character Stella Fortuna and her encounters with danger nearly resulting with her death. Starts from a small Italian village in mountains, where Fortuna's struggle to make ends, a poor life in village. Then fate takes them to America in it's complicated ways, I really loved this part where decades of the Italian immigrants lives were explored, how much they worked to make America 'great' and what it took to be a citizen.
Comparisons between the refugee crises and the people fleeing ww2 from Europe to America were spot on...

Some Trigger warnings: The book touches dark and disturbing subjects (rape, incest) from time to time but it doesn't go cringey/graphic and more importantly doesn't victimise the female characters so I did the feel disgusted like I felt in some other books. The style of writing is poetic and names are such an important part of this book- which made me think of A Hundred years of Solitude a lot!

I can go on forever but this is an epic book, could be defined as a lot of things; a family saga, a slice of history, a look at women's struggles in Italian traditions, I have read this over a weekend and literally was lost in the pages. Really enjoyed it, a five star read.

Somewhere between 4 and 4.5 stars

"This is the story of Mariastella Fortuna the Second, called Stella, formerly of Ievoli, a mountain village of Calabria, Italy, and lately of Connecticut, in the United States of America. Her life stretched over more than a century, and during that life she endured much bad luck and hardship. This is the story how she never died."

After reading the opening paragraph which gives you a pretty good idea of what the book is about, I knew I would enjoy this book. And I was right! Written as a memoir by a descendant of Stella Fortuna, the story centers around Stella and her family. It is a fascinating account of an Italian family adapting to an American way of life in 1940s and beyond. Stella comes from a humble background but is strong willed and stubborn from a very young age which does not fit in well with the traditional Italian patriarchal family structure. Throughout the book I was rooting for Stella to get her ways despite her whole family opposing to her ideas. Stella is also cursed or so does her mother believes as Stella comes near death way too many times throughout her life.

I'm neither Italian or American but still found the topic of the book very interesting. Highly recommended!

Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for my review copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a good read. But I did not feel totally hooked by it. I found a lot of the characters unlikeable and thought the story dragged a bit. Overall though it is an interesting read.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy.

I'm afraid this book disappointed me for some reasons. The opening was very interesting, intriguing, but I was quickly let down afterwards.
I guess there's a trend with 7 deaths somehow because there are a few books out there, although not exactly the same. The near death experiences was the core of a memoir written by Maggie O'Farrell, and I loved that book. But of course that was a real life story rather than fiction.
I couldn't get along with the writing in this book first of all, as it was from a third person perspective. And I think it's one of the hardest to pull off. In this case, I didn't think it was successful. It was like a chronological order of events rather than an emotional life story. It felt very distant and cold. Second is, the names were mentioned very frequently, which was disruptive to the reading experience. On one small page, the same name was repeated 5 times. The sentences were also short and felt choppy.
Other main reason is the book is very dark, and it just doesn't change throughout the book. it's bad luck after bacd luck without a break. I understand in Italy, small town, male dominated society, but it didn't change in America as well.
Also, the book was very long for what it tells, so detailed that I had to skim read some pages.
Lastly, trigger warnings for abuse and incest for sensitive readers.
So, I'm afraid it wasn't for me, but I'm sure it will appeal to some readers who has different taste.

Thanks a lot to NetGalley and the publisher for granting a free e-copy in exchange for an honest review.

Beautiful writing capturing the essence of life for a women in a male dominated world. Both village Italy and America for migrants are truly atmospheric..The story moves along at a steady pace as we travel through Stella's life. A very good read

I felt that this book dragged a bit. The writing was slightly clunky in places and it suffered a bit from the need to get enough detail in to make the story realistic. But I enjoyed the descriptions of Italian village life and the story itself is quite remarkable..

One of those tricky books for me,where you can see there was probably a lot of research into Italian American family's in the 20's.... how it was all very male dominated,the hardships poverty brought... but none of it touched me.
I read it,but I didn't enjoy it.... by quarter of the way through it just felt like bad luck after bad luck.
Pleased to see most of the other reviews are positive.
Sometimes there are perfectly decent books you just can't get on with.
I think this was one.

This is the story of the life of Stella Fortuna. The narrator is her grand-daughter who tells the story in chronological order from before her birth to her final "death". This is refeshing as so many stories these days jump from past to present. The narrator makes her presence felt in glimpses of future events and personal opinions. The narrative is punctuated with the several near-death accidents which Stella suffers. However, the physical scars are less than the mental scars inflicted upon her by her father, who basically blights not only her life but her mother's and grand-daughters' too. Stella starts off feisty and determined not to marry or bear children as she has seen her mother suffer in both aspects. However, she gets beaten down and her wishes are ignored. She has a strong bond with her sister, Tina but that too is taken away in the end. The influence of the original Mariastella adds a mystical aspect. The settings, in Italy and America, are atmospheric and give a vivid picture of the life and struggles of immigrant families at that time. I loved this.

Stella Fortuna was born into abject poverty in a very small village in Calabria southern Italy. She was the second daughter of the family. Her elder sister, whom she was named for died in childhood. As a young girl Stella was burned on the arms and stomach by burning hot frying oil. Her first near death experience. Her father, a very hard man as drafted into the army. On return to the village he decides to immigrate to New York to make his fortune. Unfortunately he never sent any money home to the family, so they lived a very hard life. Little education for the girls or their brothers. Then as he said he would he sent for his family. He arranged the journey from their village to Naples then a ship to New York. On the first attempt their visas were incorrect, left with no money the family return to their village. A couple of years later her father rearranges their visas and they get to Hartford Connecticut. Although her father said they would “eat meat” and lead a better life in Hartford they lived in a tenement and had to work as labours in the tobacco industry. Stella had seven or eight near death experiences was she cursed by the evil eye, as her mother thought. A look into their lives and experiences a very complicated family.

An interesting one this. Written in linear form, the novel follows the life of one woman living in a small rural italian town and her immigration to America. Of course, that's only half the story, it's what happens to her, how she almost dies seven or eight times depending on who you ask that really matters.
The novel feels very much like a family history and saga. We start off in Calabria where the author paints a vivid picture of the fate of women here at the time. Assunta is the head of the family who cares for her four children whilst husband Antonio heads off to America in search of a better life. He sends no money home however and Assunta feels the burden of coping alone. The rural setting imitates her loneliness and her sense of isolation in every sense of the word.

Stella is one of these daughters who also feels the burden of her lot. She is expected to marry and have her own family like every other woman in the area. When she sees how her father has left her mother to struggle, she vows never to be in that position. She sees her valley and village as prisons so welcomes the chance to start again in America. The story to this point is hopeful yet sad and it's relevant to women today sadly who feel they have to follow society's norms to some degree.

I'd hoped when the story moved to America, that things would get better. There are some parts that are very tricky to read here as Antonio becomes violent. Stella is even more determined to escape and I admit I felt like that reading some of the scenes in the novel. Important to realise the severity and sense of hopelessness I guess, but still hard to read.
The locations change and so does Stella's lot in life, but not in the ways she imagines or hopes. Italy is tough but the gilded promises of America seem to be empty and at the whim of her violent father. Stella represents the fighting spirit of women which wasn't as popular then as it is now. Sad that women still have to fight in this way however.

It's not an easy read by any means but having finished it and thought about it, I can see the message and the bigger picture.

Atmospheric family saga set in Italy and America

Stella Fortuna is the second daughter in her family to bear that name, the first having died in infancy. As she grows she feels the ghostly presence of that lost sister and soon identifies her as the malign cause of her many misfortunes. The first Stella cannot rest whilst her namesake lives.

This story starts in the mountains of Calabria where Assunta Fortuna carries the whole burden of childcare for her four children, whilst her husband Antonio tries to make a new life in America. During his years away he sends no money home and Assunta relies on her own resources and the kindness of the community to make a poor but happy and safe life for her children.

Stella witnesses her father’s brief visits home and the use he makes of her mother, each time leaving her with another child who he will not support. She determines that she will never be at the mercy of a husband’s desires and will not surrender her body to any man,

Eventually, Antonio arranges visas and the family is on the last ship out of Italy before Mussolini closes the ports. In the States Stella and her sister Tina live a better standard of life although all they earn must be handed over to the father who doles out the occasional dollar or two for them to spend on themselves. Stella is determined that the family will buy a decent house and so takes on the role of guarding their savings. Eventually, a new home is made in the suburbs, but Antonio becomes increasingly vicious and depraved. Whilst her mother and sister meet his cruelties with tears and hysteria, Stella stands firm and plans her escape.

This is a story all about relationships, love and endurance and Stella is the pivot around which all else turns. Despite her many ‘deaths’, she remains strong and resolute until the end. She is a; so a staunch feminist in time before it was fashionable.

It is also a story of a way of life in the hills of Calabria, which will never be seen again. A simple life of hard work and few rewards but lived within a community which looks after each other.

The first few pages had me questioning whether I wanted to read any more, but I am so pleased I stuck with it. It is an important book with lessons for all women whatever their nationality or circumstances.

Enjoy!

Pashtpaws

Breakaway Reviewers received a copy of the book to review.

This was a good read and I was hooked from the first page.
Thank you to both NetGalley and Hodder and Stoughton for my eARC of this book in exchange for my honest unbiased review