The Mill on the Po: Misery (Book Two)

The Mill on the Po trilogy tells of the birth of Italy as a nation; its central figures are Lazzaro Scacerni and his family, their mill on the river Po, and the river itself—stately, savage, source of both life and death.

And so we arrive at the encouraging truth that quarrels and wars and all the most violent human passions, when there is good will on the part of God and man, actually contribute to the achievement of unity among men and the profit of civilization. (Riccardo Bacchelli)

Misery, set in the years 1848 to 1872, follows Giuseppe, the miller’s son, as he makes a remarkably successful career of smuggling, leaving the management of Saint Michael’s Mill to his wife, Cecilia. Yet for all Giuseppe’s schemes and successes, a torrent of tribulation threatens to sweep away all that the Scacerni family has built. Expanding the Scacerni story into its next generation, Misery deftly continues Bacchelli’s capacious and passionate masterpiece, The Mill on the Po.

Paperback, 312 pages.