historical fictions
There once was Wanda
Novel by Alan Alfredo Geday
Extract (Part I)
Wanda looked at her engagement ring, observing the glittering reflection of its diamond in the train window. It was spectacular, and the most precious thing in the world to her after Boris. She had done everything in her power to save it from the Bolsheviks. The day they came to pillage the apartment in Saint-Petersburg, she’d slipped Igor’s ring inside her nightdress. That way, she could at least be certain the looters would not take it unless they took her as well. She was pensive. This train was her destiny. She felt like she had already witnessed this moment, as if in some remote dream that was now coming to life. The landscape that rolled past was known to her. She knew and understood the language of the French passengers, for she had learned it in Lausanne. The comfort she hoped to find in France was something she’d already felt, as if all this had been written out for her. Was this the start of a new life?
The fisherboy's blues
Novel by Alan Alfredo Geday
Extract (Part II)
“Dear Mama,
As you can see, I haven’t forgotten you. I’ve been in Marseille for four months now; the time has flown by. I’ve had so much to do, and learn, and explore. It’s a huge city. I found it overwhelming at first, but there’s a magic about it as well. I feel so free here; not knowing anyone is a wonderful feeling. Livorno is just a village compared to Marseille. I think it would be impossible for me to live there again, I’d feel like I was shut up in a cell. There’s work to be had here; you can try to make something of yourself. There are lots of Italians in Marseille, so it hasn’t been too hard to fit in. We all live as a community in the Belle de Mai neighbourhood. The French call us the ‘babi’. You often see posters up in the street saying: “Italians out – French jobs for French people!” A few scammers have even offered me a false ID card if I vote for the socialist party. But with my accent and my limited vocabulary, it will be a while before they stop calling me a macaroni. I guess those idiots haven’t tried our food if they think it’s an insult to call me that! I miss your cacciucco and our long talks.”
The legend of Larry Hoover
Novel by Alan Alfredo Geday
Extract (Part III)
Beneath the Brooklyn Bridge was a place of forbidden things where they came to talk about the myth of democracy. It was a place for plotting, threats, hopes, and secrets. A place for people with nothing, but who wanted to change the course of things. People who were angry and on the brink. Here they met in secret, sometimes having to flee when they heard police sirens approach. The cops made their rounds and sometimes carried off these enemies of the social order, namely black people who had stayed outside the ghetto too late in the day to stand around a burning barrel. Nobody knew what really went on under the Brooklyn Bridge; everyone had heard legends and rumors, but only the East River knew the truth of who had pushed who into the river, and who had betrayed his fellow under that bridge, and who had taken their own life, and who had pulled the trigger or set fire to the car. Sleeping sound beneath the surface of the water were cars from the days of prohibition, the depression, and the war; New York’s gangs and Mafiosos had filled up the East River with the blood of their enemies and traitors to their cause. Between the river and the rough neighborhoods of Brooklyn, there was inspiration everywhere amidst the stories of troubled souls whispered by the trickling water.
My grandfather
Novel by Alan Alfredo Geday
Extract (Part I)
In the late afternoon along the broad sidewalks of Bensonhurst, the sweet-tart smell of marinara sauce filled the air. The Italian delis never ran out of it, and their store windows looked like a Warhol tableau, piled high with neat, immutable rows of canned tomatoes. The sauce was Bensonhurst’s bestseller, just good tomatoes with a little olive oil and a few garlic cloves, but the neighborhood didn’t just belong to the Sicilians or even the Neapolitans anymore; since the war ended, immigrants had been coming in from all over the Boot. The tri-color flag hung from nearly every building, drawing the borders of Brooklyn’s Little Italy. The neighborhood was awash with color, from giant billboards to posters for the latest blockbuster motion pictures. The record shops were always busy, and on the sidewalks market stalls were scattered in every direction. Café terraces overflowed with men busy at games of scopa, while the store windows were filled with toys and chewing-gum dispensers to pull in kids on their way home from school. Cars hummed along the roads, with yellow taxis honking and motorcycles popping, and the subway sailing high and loud above the packed streets.It was rush hour, and the residents of Bensonhurst were scurrying around one another in search of their groceries; a bunch of basil leaves here, a handful of dried eggplant there. It was almost dinner time, but lots of folks still sat chatting on the front steps of their brownstones. Others were calling into the Jewish delis for a chocolate krantz cake, a stuffed donut or a braided challah. Even in Italian New York, little pockets of the Jewish diaspora had always thrived.