Tag: immigrant

Marianne Leone reads from Christina the Astonishing: A Novel (Akashic Books, 2025)

This novel is told from the perspective of the irrepressible yet lonely Christina, an Italian American teen in 1960s Catholic Boston. In the course of searching for a way out of her messy milieu, she discovers the never-canonized St. Christina the Astonishing, who preferred birds to people, and immediately recognizes a personal lodestar. If only she could make her eleventh-grade teacher Sister Coronada see that Christina craves the kind of attention holy martyrs enjoy and deserves a better future than the conventional one that parents Joe and Rita Falcone have mapped out for her.

“As hilarious as David Sedaris and mental in the best possible way, Christina has just become my higher power.”
—Jennifer Belle, author of Swanna in Love

Discussion led by Siân Gibby, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, Queens College, CUNY.

Frank Ingrasciotta presents excerpts from Blood Type: RAGU (Next Stage Press, 2025)

Award-winning actor and playwright Frank Ingrasciotta performs excerpts from his acclaimed solo play Blood Type: RAGU, which was published this year. The 2009 off-Broadway production has continued to tour, with more than 1,200 performances nationally and internationally in more than 125 venues. The one-man play tells an affecting story involving twenty-two characters that explores a second-generation Italian American child’s delicate balance between searching for identity, embracing culture, and understanding forgiveness.

“Transcending stereotypes, Ingrasciotta is a master of comedic and dramatic balance.”
—Show Business Weekly

 

Discussion led by Fred Gardaphé, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, Queens College, CUNY.