Toscanelli's Ray

Written by an accomplished American writer who has lived in Italy for several decades, this debut novel addresses issues of expatriation and immigration, prostitution and exploitation, from the Third World to the First, set within the microcosm of late-20th century Florence, that city which is both symbolically and literally the jewel of the Italian Renaissance. It is a novel where the common humanity of the characters is found in new and radically different circumstances, and where all transpires within the passage of a tiny sliver of time, 15 hours. This is not the expatriate Florence of Henry James, Edith Wharton or William Dean Howells, rather it is that literary topos, tradition and city turned inside out, upside down, in this ground breaking novel where the sun and heavens are also part of the action, as is the underground.