Publisher's Synopsis
Emily and The Brute Gods. "beautifully-written piece of Literary Fiction..." This book is about love--filial and romantic, loss, friendship, the shadows of war, three generations, the way time slides back and forth, the need to put food on the table, attitudes towards the church, exclusion, inclusion, contrasts between town and country, yearning for a farm of one's own, rivalry, and old jealousies. Serious episodes are followed by funny episodes. Consider the Bertoldi brothers, "the brute gods" --well-fed, big-muscled, in their prime--looking down at their father in his coffin and remembering the beatings he gave them; and then deciding to take "an eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth" before it is too late.