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Lucia, Lucia
by
Adriana Trigiani (Goodreads Author)
Set in the glittering, vibrant New York City of 1950, Lucia, Lucia is the enthralling story of a passionate, determined young woman whose decision to follow her heart changes her life forever.
Lucia Sartori is the beautiful twenty-five-year-old daughter of a prosperous Italian grocer in Greenwich Village. The postwar boom is ripe with opportunities for talented girls with a...more
Lucia Sartori is the beautiful twenty-five-year-old daughter of a prosperous Italian grocer in Greenwich Village. The postwar boom is ripe with opportunities for talented girls with a...more
Hardcover, 272 pages
Published
July 8th 2003
by Random House
(first published January 1st 2003)
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Feb 05, 2009
Dorothy
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
people who know who are first generation Italians
Recommended to Dorothy by:
librarian at the Kearny library
Lucia, Lucia provides a picture of first generation Italian family life in New York's Little Italy from the 1950's to the present. Anyone who is Italian will recognize the stay at home mom, the family deli that is owned and operated by her father and her four brothers. Then there is Lucia, a hardworking, independent, woman who is ahead of her time.
Her independence is partly due to her father's support of her way of conducting her life. ( I loved him.) After all, Lucia is twenty-five. For all i...more
Her independence is partly due to her father's support of her way of conducting her life. ( I loved him.) After all, Lucia is twenty-five. For all i...more
This is the first novel that I have read by Trigiani, and I am totally hooked with her writing, and can't wait to get started on Rococo, which is now sitting on my nightstand.
Kit is a young career girl and aspiring playwright living in an aging apartment building in Greenwich Village in the early 2000s. One day, she's invited for tea by one of the older women living on the top floor of the building. Reluctantly, she takes time out of her busy schedule, but has no idea what a treat is in store f...more
Kit is a young career girl and aspiring playwright living in an aging apartment building in Greenwich Village in the early 2000s. One day, she's invited for tea by one of the older women living on the top floor of the building. Reluctantly, she takes time out of her busy schedule, but has no idea what a treat is in store f...more
As a fan of the Big Stone Gap books, I was eager to read more by Adriana Trigiani and quickly devoured this book. Set in New York's Greenwhich Village during the 1950s/ 1960s the book is narrated by Lucia Santori, the only daughter and youngest child of a large, boisterous Italian family.The book begins rather slowly although it quickly picks up speed and is easy to read.Once again, Trigiani has a knack for vivid imagery and selecting appealing adjectives that bring out the best of the story's c...more
Feb 01, 2008
Nataly
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
all friends who like to read a good book...
Shelves:
susynovelterjemahcolection
I Love all the story wraped nicely by the story of someone that at first barely noticed except as an old lady who's always dress nice and wearing long jacket everywhere she go.
Lucia is the only daughter in an Italian/American family in the 1950s. She's an accomplished seamstress and works in a famous department store in New York City. She also happens to be engaged to her childhood sweeheart and is stunned to learn that her family expects her to quit her job and stay home to help her future mot...more
Lucia is the only daughter in an Italian/American family in the 1950s. She's an accomplished seamstress and works in a famous department store in New York City. She also happens to be engaged to her childhood sweeheart and is stunned to learn that her family expects her to quit her job and stay home to help her future mot...more
2 likes · like · see review
view all 4 comments
This was such a fun book to read! The author is an Italian-American and writes about Italian-American characters in her stories set in NY. This particular novel was set in the 1950s (it begins as modern-day, flashes back to 1950 for 2/3 of story, then back to modern-day again). I have read several other books by this author and notice a number of similar themes throughout her stories: Italian-American family, trips back to homeland of Italy, fashion-oriented, strong female lead, late to marry, "...more
Lucia is the only daughter in an Italian/American family in the 1950s. She's an accomplished seamstress and works in a famous department store in New York City. She also happens to be engaged to her childhood sweeheart and is stunned to learn that her family expects her to quit her job and stay home to help her future mother-in-law and prepare to have children. Remember - this is the 1950s. Lucia calls off her engagement and begins to lead the most interesting life in the world of fashion. The a...more
so i just finished listening to this book read by Mira Sorvino. i liked it but i find it hard to believe that Lucia's life decisions really made her happy. i don't know how a person could love their job more than having a life with people you love. i think she would have felt quite lonely in her life. this is the second trigiani book i've read and it seems that her stories focus on being an independent career woman and how that sometimes trumps being married and having children. i think my prior...more
Dear Adriana,
I know you have a lot of loyal fans who love your work. I like your work too, but I believe you have it in you to do a lot better than you do. This book is a nice light read, pretty good popular fiction.
BUT Italian Americans need a LITERATURE to document the early years, and the meter is ticking. Movies & TV have shown the world some wonderful Italian family portraits, but they are crime family portraits, they do not portray the everyday vibrancy of the many Little Italies all o...more
I know you have a lot of loyal fans who love your work. I like your work too, but I believe you have it in you to do a lot better than you do. This book is a nice light read, pretty good popular fiction.
BUT Italian Americans need a LITERATURE to document the early years, and the meter is ticking. Movies & TV have shown the world some wonderful Italian family portraits, but they are crime family portraits, they do not portray the everyday vibrancy of the many Little Italies all o...more
Kit is a playwright living in New York. She hasn't had much luck so far, and lives in an apartment in a rather dilapidated old building. She is on nodding acquaintance with other residents, but finds herself strangely drawn to an elderly lady known to everyone as Aunt Lu.
Kit - somewhat reluctantly - accepts an invitation to tea with Aunt Lu, and am amazing friendship begins. Lu - whose name is really Lucia - starts to talk about her life as a young Italian growing up in America in the 1950s. Sh...more
Kit - somewhat reluctantly - accepts an invitation to tea with Aunt Lu, and am amazing friendship begins. Lu - whose name is really Lucia - starts to talk about her life as a young Italian growing up in America in the 1950s. Sh...more
Aug 27, 2012
Linda Bouley
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
family-relationships,
immigrants
This was so well written - the story of a young ambitious woman in a large, tightly knit Italian family in the 1950's, a family that still lives by the rules of their culture in NYC's Little Italy. The underlying theme is Lucia's desire to be part of the uptown Manhattan scene while still fulfilling her role in the family...her parents and her 4 older brothers. She has been trained as a seamstress by her grandmother and is so talented that she ends up in the couture department of B-Altman in the...more
If Jane Austen were somehow transported to the 20th century Manhattan, I'm pretty sure she'd would have written a novel like Lucia, Lucia. Author Adriana Trigiani has channeled many of the recurring themes in Jane Austen's novels; an interesting family dynamic, filled with the inevitable crises, the plight and constraints of women in society, the search for love, and ensuing heartbreak. I loved the characters, especially the protagonist Lucia. Born into a large Italian family, Lucia respects tra...more
well,, i cant say that i love this story. Because even its happy ending, Lucia dont have much happiness in her life. But i can say that this book is amazing! The writer is brilliant! i love how she tell about the family story in 1950's, and about the cultures. Like they still have strong religion, still lived with their parents til they married and also how they must keep her virginity til they married. Its really good story. Even it sounds ancient to the western, but believe it or not it still...more
I absolutely loved this story!
With a few minor changes, Lucia could have been
my mom.
A compelling theme to me in a story is an
exploration of what could have been.
Lucia, Lucia is a story that touches on that theme.
Lucia is the most beautiful girl in
Greenwich Village and the only daughter
in an Italian Catholic family. She longs
to be a career woman yet she also loves
the close ties of her family. The book
begins with Lucia as an elderly woman,
telling the story of her life to a...more
With a few minor changes, Lucia could have been
my mom.
A compelling theme to me in a story is an
exploration of what could have been.
Lucia, Lucia is a story that touches on that theme.
Lucia is the most beautiful girl in
Greenwich Village and the only daughter
in an Italian Catholic family. She longs
to be a career woman yet she also loves
the close ties of her family. The book
begins with Lucia as an elderly woman,
telling the story of her life to a...more
Not the sort of book I'd usually go for, but well-written, with a lively, warm narrative that draws you in and makes you want to carry on reading. I picked it off the book-sharing shelf at a local café because I once had a very kind friend named Lucia and I've always liked the name. The warm colours of the covers and the lack of much pink attracted me, too. That's as a book should be, and this lived up tfo its promises. The titular character, Lucia Sartori, was bright and warm, at the same time...more
I would call this book old-fashioned chick lit. The main character is Lucia, an elderly woman, introduced in chapter one. Lucia recounts the story of her youth to her neighbor, Kit, who is a struggling playwright living in the same apartment building as Lucia, or Aunt Lu as she is called by the residents. The bulk of the story takes place in the 1950s and only returns to present day in the book's final chapter.
Lucia tells the tale of her younger days, when she was the most beautiful girl in New...more
Lucia tells the tale of her younger days, when she was the most beautiful girl in New...more
This book gives a glimpse into the life of a single, young Italian girl living in New York in the 1950's. The author does a good job in setting the scene for this book, and in detailing the frustration of the post war timeframe where people are trying to find their place in the world. World War II changed the dynamics between women and men, and also broadened peoples perspective in dealing with other peoples cultures and nationalities. Lucia Sartori is a young Italian woman who is working as a s...more
Immediately, I *hated* the frame story. The opening character, Kit, is a struggling playwright living in Greenwich Village who ventures up to the apartment of the aged but elegant "Aunt Lu" and has tea while listening to her story, which is the basis of the book. My dislike of the frame only got worse when it finally reappeared (after no mention of it throughout Lucia's story) at the end of the book. The characters, including the old Lucia, are flat and there is very little to connect them to th...more
3 likes · like · see review
Very sad story with well-drawn characters, so I truly shared in their sorrows. However, I found it somewhat disappointing after reading the Big Stone Gap books; those books had a realism, flow, and internal integrity that this book seemed to lack. I kept saying Huh...what the...now why would...enough already...wise up...The characters were engaging, yet the story just didn't hang together and compute with me. The explanation about the aunt's curse just didn't cut it, when so much of what was goi...more
This book started strong, and kept me going through the middle. It is a believable tale of a close Italian family and a passionate young Italian girl. The family goes through all kinds of life changing events together, and I love how they all react and then move on together.
Then, the book takes a left turn from normal, good and bad life events and starts just beating the hell out of the main character, taking away everything that she cares about, and then letting her live for others and not be...more
Then, the book takes a left turn from normal, good and bad life events and starts just beating the hell out of the main character, taking away everything that she cares about, and then letting her live for others and not be...more
I really enjoyed this book, I was having a rest from thrillers and the Supernatural, getting a bit tired of the explicitness of some of the books around at the moment, so this was a fabulous antidote.
The blurb tells the story, so I wont repeat it, but to say that it was gentle, and amusing, and heartbreaking, with a hint of say a Doris Day type film (which I also love). It was easy to read, it was a book you wanted to continue reading at every chance, and I felt sad to say goodbye to the charact...more
The blurb tells the story, so I wont repeat it, but to say that it was gentle, and amusing, and heartbreaking, with a hint of say a Doris Day type film (which I also love). It was easy to read, it was a book you wanted to continue reading at every chance, and I felt sad to say goodbye to the charact...more
I really enjoyed this book. The story is framed through the eyes of a Greenwich Village aspiring playwright getting to know her upstairs neighbor, a beautiful old woman named Lucia, who settles down to tell her life story.
As a fashionista, seamstress, and career girl of the 50s, Lucia was an intensely interesting character with a huge Italian family and a troubled romantic life--both of which set the plot going strong. I adored all the characters and Ms. Trigiani's writing was beautiful, especi...more
As a fashionista, seamstress, and career girl of the 50s, Lucia was an intensely interesting character with a huge Italian family and a troubled romantic life--both of which set the plot going strong. I adored all the characters and Ms. Trigiani's writing was beautiful, especi...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
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A young Italian girl gets a job designing clothing for a major department store. She is engaged and loving life, until...she meets a man who absolutely sweeps her off her feet. She dumps her fiance to marry this new stranger, but trouble puts her hopes of marriage and career on a different track. Ok story and characters. The writing is lots of dialogue and not very descriptive. Not very engaging, but a quick, fairly good read.
It was the early 1950s and though career women were making their way in the society, the roles of women were still somehow limited to being a housewife and a mother. Most people were having a difficult time accepting something not traditional, which I find sad. But Lucia was different. She loved to work and had dreams to pursue. Sure she may have wanted to be married but she did not want to give up her career. She fell in love, but fate happened. =( I anticipated John's actions but I still got t...more
I picked this up after having seen Adriana speak at a local high school. She is a fantastic speaker!! I cannot recommend highly enough that you take the opportunity to see her speak if you can. I had only previously read The Shoemaker's Wife, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I figured I'd read a couple of her stand-alones and save the Big Stone Gap trilogy for the summer.
This would have been a four-star rating if not for the ending of Lucia's "story". Without giving away too much, I felt that this co...more
This would have been a four-star rating if not for the ending of Lucia's "story". Without giving away too much, I felt that this co...more
I love Adriana Trigiani's books - they are like eating whipped cream sprinkled with pastel coloured speckles of candy whilst sitting in your Sunday best clothes. Yes they are sentimental and a little simplistic but somehow very comforting and they make me feel life has great value.
In Lucia Lucia the book is set in New York in the early 1950s and Lucia is the most beautiful girl in the village. She works in a department store and loves her job sewing custom dresses. She is italian and engaged to...more
In Lucia Lucia the book is set in New York in the early 1950s and Lucia is the most beautiful girl in the village. She works in a department store and loves her job sewing custom dresses. She is italian and engaged to...more
Jan 29, 2008
Katie
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
anyone interested in New York in the past or sewing.
I just finished this book and I really liked it. It's set in New York City in the 1950's, which I loved and I also loved that the main character, Lucia, is a seamstress at the Custom Department in a major department store in Manhattan. This book told a story of a girl from a different time and the author did a great job of making the reader able to visualize what life was like during the 50's.
1 like · like · see review
This was a terrific book. I felt completely immersed into Lucia's world as a young woman in Little Italy in New York City. The world she describes is vastly different than New York City today: department stores with custom design departments, ladies wearing gloves and hats, etc. This book is a wonderful escape that I highly recommend!
I couldn't put this book down--I absolutely loved it. Lucia is a wonderful protagonist, and one with whom I completely related. The setting of the book is completely engaging, and I believed all the characters. Didn't love the bookend framing technique set in present day, but the rest of the book was so good, I was able to overlook it.
4 likes · like · see review
OK - Trigiani has rapidly become my favourite Author - even above Anita Shreve and Mark Billingham ( I love Tom Thorne!!) - this book is a classic. Trigiani has a beautiful fluid style to her writing. Her attention to detail is flawless. This book slips effortlessly between the modern day and the wonder of the 1950's - when Lucia was a young girl, becoming a woman in the world. I was lost in the colour and style of the era. Trigiani brings it alive - all wrapped up in the warmth of the soft warm...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton | 5 | 45 | Oct 20, 2012 04:38pm | |
| Fashion Book Lovers!: Lucia, Lucia by Adriana Trigiani | 6 | 14 | Jun 02, 2012 05:35am |
Bestselling author Adriana Trigiani is beloved by millions of readers around the world for her hilarious and heartwarming novels. Adriana was raised in a small coal-mining town in southwest Virginia in a big Italian family. She chose her hometown for the setting and title of her debut novel, the critically acclaimed bestseller Big Stone Gap. The heartwarming story continues in the novel's sequels...more
More about Adriana Trigiani...
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“The good things that happen to us were meant to happen, and the bad things that happen are lessons meant to teach us to be better.”
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