How Fires End cover art

How Fires End

A Novel

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How Fires End

By: Marco Rafalà
Narrated by: Angelo Di Loreto
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About this listen

A dark secret born out of World War II lies at the heart of a Sicilian American family in this emotional and sweeping saga of guilt, revenge, and, ultimately, redemption.

After soldiers vacate the Sicilian hillside town of Melilli in the summer of 1943, the locals celebrate, giving thanks to their patron saint, Sebastian. Amid the revelry, all it takes is one fateful moment for the destiny of nine-year-old Salvatore Vassallo to change forever. When his twin brothers are killed playing with an unexploded mortar shell, Salvatore’s faith is destroyed. As the family unravels, and fear ignites among their neighbors that the Vassallo name is cursed, one tragedy begets another.

Desperate to escape this haunting legacy, Salvatore accepts the help of an Italian soldier with fascist ties who ushers him and his sister, Nella, into a new beginning in America. In Middletown, Connecticut, in the immigrant neighborhood known as Little Melilli, these three struggle to build new lives for themselves. But a dangerous choice to keep their secrets hidden erupts in violence decades later. When Salvatore loses his inquisitive American-born son, David, they all learn too late the price sons pay for their fathers’ wars.

Written with elegiac prose, How Fires End delves into the secret wars of men; the sins they cannot bury; and a life lived in fear of who will reveal them, who will survive them, and who will forgive them.

©2019 Marco Rafalà (P)2019 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.
Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction War & Military War

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Critic reviews

“Marco Rafalà ignites all kinds of fires in this brightly burning novel fueled by old vendettas and unresolved resentments. A tremendous, well-crafted debut.” --Idra Novey, award-winning author of Those Who Knew and Ways to Disappear

“What happens when the fires we nurture with hate die? How Fires End is a breathtaking multigenerational story of fathers and sons who yearn for warmth amid the ashes of their own secrets and lies. Generous, bold, epic, Marco Rafalà’s novel is a triumph.” --Brando Skyhorse, award-winning author of The Madonnas of Echo Park and Take This Man: A Memoir

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