The Shoemaker's Wife
A Novel

Every once in awhile you have to take a break from the Holocaust books, the slavery sagas and the dysfunctional families... and this, my friends, is the beach read you are looking for. The old Italian-immigrant-comes-to-America-makes-good-intergenerational-story that your preteen daughter could read......more

This was a recent choice by one of the book clubs I belong to and when I heard it was the choice, I was less than thrilled. "Oh, man," I thought. "Not ANOTHER star-crossed lovers book set during the war." I had half a mind to just not read it but decided to force myself to plod through the book and......more

If there’s one book that should be on your summer reading list, it’s The Shoemaker’s Wife. It isn’t just a book; it’s an experience. It’s a slow, beautiful, compelling story with which you can’t help but feel involved and enamoured. No matter what chapter you are on in this book, the setting is alway......more

Meh. Overly descriptive, is that a bad thing? Sometimes. Sometimes it is so oppressive that you just breeze over the chapter. Sometimes it's kind of lovely. Despite a book where SO MUCH happens, not much happens, you know? I mean, one moment you are in the Italian Alps, the next NYC, then Minnesota.......more

The first part of this story was very good, but it lost steam about halfway through. At first, I enjoyed Trigiani's many descriptions of food, architecture, and scenery. They invoked in me an overwhelming desire to travel to the Italian Alps and eat custard baked by nuns. After a while though, Trigi......more