Orani

Nivola's father's Sardinian birthplace wasn't perfect in the 1950s—there were nettles, scorpions, even bandits. Still, with its modest red roofs cradled in a scenic valley and welcoming relatives (including the forty-one cousins to whom this book is dedicated), Orani was a fascinating, mind-opening place for the young girl to visit. An excellent note explains that Nivola's parents had escaped from Italy to America in 1939 "under the dual pressure of fascism and anti-Semitism" and describes the book's postwar setting as a time when "Orani was shaking free of abject poverty, yet no one had too much; when new ways had not yet torn it away from what was rich in its past." Recalling this amiable period, Nivola depicts a close-knit community where children can see where things come from—clothes from a tailor, water from the mountain, grain from the miller, "each food…made by the work of someone's hands." The free-ranging children observe marriage, a new baby, even (when they visit a family in mourning) a dead body. Returning home, the author/narrator brings back a sense of wonder: what might be the stories, the remembered places, of the crowds of strangers in New York City? Orani and its people are lovingly evoked in Nivola's watercolor and gouache paintings, from expansive views to more intimate scenes, from children thronging narrow streets and family gatherings to pensive vignettes. It's not a nostalgic picture, but one of lively children thriving in a real community that's nurtured by its simple way of life. Joanna Rudge Long