Publisher's Synopsis
"Look to the rock from which you were hewn." - Isaiah 51:1. The favorite son of one of New York's most formidable dynasties, Leonardo Riccardi has everything a man could want: power, wealth, status - and Isabella, his stunningly beautiful wife. All this changes when his father, Don Benito Riccardi, publicly reveals that Leonardo is not his blood son, but was cruelly abducted at birth from his impoverished migrant parents. Crushed and humiliated, Leonardo turns his back on the father he feels has deceived him. He soon discovers, however, that the world outside the protection of the Riccardi family is very, very tough. . . When Don Benito dies his true son, Enrico, takes control of the family. Coveting Isabella and fearful of Leonardo's popularity, Enrico frames Leonardo for murder and he is sent to prison. Ten years pass. Leonardo is now living rough on the streets. A broken man, he has no name, no family, and no birthright. He has, however, one burning ambition: to discover his real parents and his true heritage. Only then will he truly learn who he is. Starting with their arrival in New York as destitute Italian migrants, Leonardo traces his parents' journeys from northern Italy, to Britain, and finally across to America. The parallel stories that unfold tell of his parents' individual struggles through incredible hardship and adversity as each fights a desperate battle to survive. As he discovers the shocking truth of the world in which his parents lived, Leonardo realizes that his own ordeal was but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of human suffering and endurance. At last, his search brings him his resolve, and with it, the name bestowed on him by his mother 45 years previously: Luca.
