Showing results by author "Loretta Giacoletto" in All Categories

Too much togetherness spells disaster for these thirty-something sisters vacationing in Italy. When glamorous Margo opts for a steamy romance in Florence, "plain jane" Ellen travels alone to their next destination, a charming hillside villa at La Spezia. The owner Lorenz, a mysterious widower, insists on showing Ellen around Cinque Terre, five picturesque villages overlooking the Ligurian Sea.

Newly-widowed Francesca Canelli is not your typical soccer mom but she would do anything to help her 15-year-old son, Matt, a passionate soccer player determined to honor his dad's memory. Financially strapped and emotionally devastated, Francesca accepts a sexual proposition from the coach of Pegasi United who promised to secure Matt a starting position on his premier St. Louis team. Their bargain quickly sours when the coach abuses Francesca, demeans Matt, and threatens to renege on the deal.

Rose Bianco has been working her entire married life in the St. Louis bakery her husband Sal inherited from his parents. Now Bianco's is closing, the entire block destined for the headache ball to accommodate another tacky discount store. If only Rose and Sal could agree on how to spend their retirement years. She wants to travel; he wants to open a mom and pop fishing resort in Missouri's Ozarks.

Lidia and Simon Drago are living their last hoorah, a European vacation financed by insurance money they received when their house burned down. On the night train from Paris to Florence they encounter a stranger who directs them to a lovely pensione in Florence. There, a clever artist agrees to depict the Dragos not as they look now but how they appeared in their prime. If only Lidia and Simon hadn't talked to the stranger, or taken his advice about the pensione.

Step back in time to Prohibition and prostitution during the Roaring Twenties. Follow Giulietta Bracca's notorious rise to wealth and power, from street urchin in 1905 Genoa, Italy, to the headmistress of Night School, Chicago's most popular and innovative men's club in the 1920s. Along the way Giulietta plays a deadly game of one-upmanship with men who use her, abuse her, and fall head-over-heels in love with her. This quick-study seductress soon learns to give as good as she gets, and with few regrets.