Roland Merullo reads from his novel In Revere, In Those Days

In Revere, In Those Days (Shaye Areheart Books, 2002) is the story of the Benedetto family from the small coastal city Revere, Massachusetts. The story’s narrator is Anthony Benedetto, a boy who is trying to reconcile his family’s rich, old-world heritage with the unstoppable freight train that is American culture. Anthony introduces the reader to his extended family, men and women who struggle toward decency and kindness, and who live out their difficult lives with an extraordinary dignity. As the outside world calls to him, Anthony grows up and moves away from Revere, realizing that geography is destiny, suffering is universal, and that his priceless inheritance forms the essence of who he becomes as a man.