The Fireflies of Autumn

Book excerpt: San Ginese is a village where God lingers in people’s minds and many dream of California, Argentina or Australia. Some leave only to return feeling disheartened, wishing they had never come back, some never leave and forever wish they had. The Fireflies of Autumn takes us to the olive groves and piazzas of this little-known Tuscan village. There we meet Bucchione, who was haunted by the Angel of Sadness; Lo Zena, his neighbour, with whom he feuded for forty years; Tommaso the Killer, the Adulteress, the Dead Boy and many others. These are tales of war and migration, feasts and misfortunes – of a people and their place over the course of the twentieth century. ‘I have never read a migrant tale so original, so breathtaking in scope, or so magical. I have not since stopped thinking about the characters in San Ginese.’ ALICE PUNG ‘Astonishing in the seductiveness and uniqueness of its storytelling. I read it greedily, not wanting to leave San Ginese and return to the real world.’ CHRISTOS TSIOLKAS