It’s a pleasure to be welcoming Francesca Scanacapra back to Novel Kicks and the blog tour for her book, Casa Paradiso – 300 Years in the Life of a House which is book four in the Paradiso series. 

Lombardy, Northern Italy, 1637

Cristó Lovetta, a skilled stonemason, arrives in the rural village of Pieve Santa Clara to work on a nobleman’s house.

Haunted by a tragic past, Cristó wonders if he will ever find happiness again. However, as he immerses himself in his work, the warmth of the community and the beauty of the landscape convince him to begin a new life there.

Cristó designs and builds his own house, which he names Casa Paradiso. Over the centuries, Casa Paradiso becomes home to many generations, standing testament to lives beginning and ending, and witnessing the everyday challenges and triumphs of its inhabitants – from love lost and found, to the tragedies of war, the far-reaching consequences of political decisions made by powerful men and the evolving role of women in Italian society.

Casa Paradiso – the fourth instalment of the Paradiso Novels – is a shining, evocative saga spanning three hundred years in the life of a very special house, and a book that explores the enduring strength of the human spirit, contrasted with the transient nature of life itself.

Francesca has shared an extract with us today. We hope you enjoy it. 

*****beginning of extract*****

This is the start of the third story in the book, beginning in 1680. Carolina Lovetta has inherited Paradiso and the house’s colourful and rich history is being formed bit by bit, as fascination people visit this strong, independent woman in her home.

1680

CAROLINA LOVETTA

Casa Paradiso was a respectable establishment of excellent reputation, catering for select paying guests. It was both owned and run by Carolina Lovetta, now in the thirty-sixth year of her life. She was a woman of many talents – resourceful, industrious and highly-esteemed within the community.

Carolina had written signboards placed along the Via Postumia advertising rooms to let, which worked well to attract the right calibre of clientele, because only those who were able to read could follow them. Her lodgers included merchants, members of the clergy, men of law and men of letters, as well as a regular traffic of artisans, particularly those associated with the luthiery crafts. With Pieve Santa Clara being situated not quite twenty miles from Cremona – a city world-renowned for the manufacture of the finest stringed instruments – Casa Paradiso was perfectly positioned as a rest-stop. Even Maestro Antonio Stradivari himself, the most famed of Cremona’s violin-makers, had stayed with Carolina on numerous occasions. His employees and fellow luthiers were frequent guests, and Maestro Stradivari even recommended Casa Paradiso to his clients.

That crisp late autumn morning Carolina was seeing off Signor Zucca, a cordaro by profession, procurer and spinner of strings for musical instruments. He always overnighted at Casa Paradiso to rest both himself and his horses on his way to and from the sheep pastures of Colazzo. Sheep gut made for the most prized strings, not just for the bowed instruments, such as violins, violas and cellos; but also for lutes, guitars and mandolins, all of which were produced in Cremona.

Continue reading →

by