Speaker 1: So I remember once talking to my grandmother about how
Speaker 1: she met my grandfather, and the crazy thing is they
Speaker 1: went to high school together and he was like the
Speaker 1: coolest guy who went to their high school. And then
Speaker 1: after they graduated, she saw him on the street and
Speaker 1: I thought it was really cute. You know, grand birds
Speaker 1: are adorable. Throw all that out the window for I
Speaker 1: Know this Much is true. Because this is Popcorn Book
Speaker 1: Club from My Heart Radio, and on this episode we
Speaker 1: continue our discussion of Wally Lamb's novel I Know this
Speaker 1: Much is true, which you know, it's like, I Know
Speaker 1: this much is incredibly traumatic. So we're diving into the
Speaker 1: story of Dominico on no Fryo Tempesta, the grandfather of
Speaker 1: the Birds, EA Twins and folks. Things get weird. I
Speaker 1: will not have a wife. I will have this monkey
Speaker 1: in a cross stitch on someone's house. You'd be like,
Speaker 1: I gotta get out of this house. This is part
Speaker 1: four of our series, so jump back to episode three
Speaker 1: if you want to start a little bit earlier, or
Speaker 1: up one if you haven't caught up yet. Here we go.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Popcorn Book Club. I'm Danish Schwartz and
Speaker 1: as always I'm joined by Cromadanca, Jennifer Right, Tantran, and
Speaker 1: Melissa Hunter. Hi everyone, Hi, could someone describe where we
Speaker 1: left off last time? I went through the book and
Speaker 1: I like made a bunch of notes and like tried
Speaker 1: to make a timeline, but then I had to keep
Speaker 1: going back and adding stuff and like changing and altering.
Speaker 1: And I was, you did do the homework. I thought,
Speaker 1: you're good at therapy. Thank you. Can I graduate now? Yes,
Speaker 1: I say, you can graduate. Thank you, Betsy. I hope
Speaker 1: you're listening to this. Betsy is my therapist. So the
Speaker 1: last part that we had talked about was the beginning
Speaker 1: of Domenico on all Freo Tempesta's story, where he talked
Speaker 1: about coming to the United States and he was on
Speaker 1: the deck of the ship and there were those rich
Speaker 1: people who were like, get backed down into the browels
Speaker 1: of the ship where you belong, and he was like,
Speaker 1: the world is full of stairs. Some go up and
Speaker 1: some go down, which is not an expression I'm fully
Speaker 1: sure I understand. But um so, then Dominic is at
Speaker 1: home after having been released from the hospital, finding out
Speaker 1: that Joy cheated on him with her uncle who was
Speaker 1: also her molester as a child, and that she was pregnant.
Speaker 1: More on that later. UM, and he considers suicide and
Speaker 1: he's sort of at his lowest low. He really hits
Speaker 1: bottom when he's at home from the hospital, but thankfully
Speaker 1: he calls Leo, doesn't make an actual gesture or attempt
Speaker 1: at suicide. He gets help, which is probably part of
Speaker 1: the work of the therapy honestly. Well, yeah, and so
Speaker 1: then it becomes very largely about Domenico story. So we
Speaker 1: can now talk about the things that happen. Um. Starting
Speaker 1: get all that out of the way. Those brothers, UM.
Speaker 1: I think it was Melissa who said something was going
Speaker 1: to happen with the brothers. She was like, nothing is good,
Speaker 1: so the brothers aren't gonna end up well, and thankfully
Speaker 1: it wasn't that they raped Dominic's mom but thank god,
Speaker 1: which I think we were all shocked by. I think, um,
Speaker 1: so many terrible things happened in this book that I
Speaker 1: just fully assumed that Dominic's mom was by an uncle
Speaker 1: or her father, And no, she wasn't put a put
Speaker 1: a nice turn of events. Well, yeah, we'll get into
Speaker 1: that later. But yeah, I will not go into the
Speaker 1: rape or incest foreshadowing. Oh. So, yeah, Domenico comes to
Speaker 1: the United States and he befriends a librarian in New York.
Speaker 1: They live in a thriving Italian community and he works
Speaker 1: as a janitor, and then he and his brothers find
Speaker 1: out that there's this sort of like new up and
Speaker 1: coming Italian community that's going to be in Three Rivers, Connecticut.
Speaker 1: So he's like, Oh, let's all move to Three Rivers,
Speaker 1: Connecticut and get jobs there because they've got lots of
Speaker 1: jobs and they've got some Sicilianos and we can just
Speaker 1: go hang out with other Sicilians in this new place.
Speaker 1: And so they do that, and then he starts working
Speaker 1: as Domenico starts working as like a fabric dyer at
Speaker 1: a factory. And both of his brothers are sort of
Speaker 1: ne'er duels in different ways. One of them a little
Speaker 1: not neir duels, that's like a but a little like
Speaker 1: quirky quirky. They have different quirkies, have one primary trait.
Speaker 1: One is one of the night and the other one
Speaker 1: is obsessed with his pet Mommy. The monkey monkey has
Speaker 1: actually come up a lot in which is wild because
Speaker 1: I was like, it's a lot of monkey imagery in here,
Speaker 1: because prospering and who will get into a little bit later,
Speaker 1: but she's constantly described as looking like a monkey and
Speaker 1: referred to as the monkey throughout Domenico's story and then
Speaker 1: Dominant Dominic it's called the spider monkey by his mom,
Speaker 1: which did make me think of Twilight, and Dominic calls
Speaker 1: the Tiffany a little monkey, but in a in a
Speaker 1: sweet way, it seems like, yeah. And then also the
Speaker 1: rabbit imagery is the mom would call Thomas her little rabbit,
Speaker 1: and then she was called a rabbit. And then there's
Speaker 1: some witchcraft with rabbits that will get into and then
Speaker 1: some curse forgiveness with some rabbits. There's sometimes describing this
Speaker 1: book to other people feels like a mad lib. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it does. Okay, I'm gonna I know I'm breaking my
Speaker 1: rule of breaking out of domenico story. But have any
Speaker 1: of you read Holes? Yes? Okay, so you know at
Speaker 1: the end of Holes where uh he Stanley breaks the
Speaker 1: old his grandfather's curse by carrying zero open hill and
Speaker 1: then everything works out and then he gets and then
Speaker 1: he finds the money and everything's great. Rabbits, he broke
Speaker 1: the curse, he broke Prosperines evil lie curse, and then
Speaker 1: it's like, and now you get your your bad luck
Speaker 1: of schizophrenia and suicide is over. Now you get money
Speaker 1: and wife and now dad. Yeah. So it felt like
Speaker 1: it felt like he broke the curse and then he
Speaker 1: just got to have everything he wanted. Just because of
Speaker 1: the premise of this podcast, I do have to say
Speaker 1: that Holes was my first really positive experience with a
Speaker 1: book to film adaptation. I feel like when they did
Speaker 1: a very good job of adapting and also including rap,
Speaker 1: so good job. Yeah. If you guys, if the three
Speaker 1: of you who have not who are not familiar with Holes,
Speaker 1: want to go enjoy it the Holes Rap, I highly
Speaker 1: recommend it. It's called digging. Okay, I'm already who wants
Speaker 1: to dive into what happens to the brothers? And then
Speaker 1: we get the sisters, well fake sisters or cousin fake cousins.
Speaker 1: Um I can so Vincenzo, whose primary trade is that
Speaker 1: Vincenzo loves to fuck um She's the statue of liberty
Speaker 1: and says if all the women in America this large,
Speaker 1: they will need need me to fill up their enormous pussies,
Speaker 1: all right, like strong, strong stoke from Vincenzo. Um So
Speaker 1: Vincentso ends up being employed at a grocery store, and
Speaker 1: one of the reasons he's employed there is because he's
Speaker 1: constantly having sex with women, and women come in to
Speaker 1: the grocery store to ce Vincenzo and have affairs with them. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, you know Jews, they're so greedy, they higher
Speaker 1: I sing I did. I didn't feel about that. It's like, oh,
Speaker 1: the Italian grocers like, why won't he work it here,
Speaker 1: and it's like, I don't know, and the Jewish grocer
Speaker 1: is like, yes, no, come bring us money. Yeah. Obviously
Speaker 1: Domenico is someone who is not an ally of the
Speaker 1: Jewish community. I imagine. I think it's just an ally
Speaker 1: of Domenico. That's fair. So at one point, Um, the
Speaker 1: local priest comes to Domenico and says, please stop your
Speaker 1: brother from having sex with every single woman in the
Speaker 1: town of Free Rivers, Connecticut. It is bringing a bad
Speaker 1: name up on all Italians. And Um Domenico is very
Speaker 1: angry about this. Um it's uh, it's a rift between
Speaker 1: him and the religious community. And shortly after his brother
Speaker 1: of Vincento, is caught my jealous husband and shot and dies.
Speaker 1: So that's why, yeah, yeah, that's I feel like that's
Speaker 1: also a theme that very topic comes back around. Um.
Speaker 1: But you know, life goes on for Domenico, and he
Speaker 1: still has his other brother, who he certainly is not
Speaker 1: having sex with a bunch of ladies, but gets this
Speaker 1: pet monkey that he loves perhaps too much. UM, and
Speaker 1: we don't know. I'm gonna to couch it by saying allegedly,
Speaker 1: I don't know having sex with the monkey, but there
Speaker 1: becomes a rumor in town that he's having sex with
Speaker 1: the monkey. And also I want to point out the
Speaker 1: one really embarrassing anecdote that Domenico says is he walked
Speaker 1: into his brother's room one morning and his brother had
Speaker 1: morning would and the monkey was on doing his pant page.
Speaker 1: And he told that story to the priest, and like
Speaker 1: the way the priest navigates, being like, okay, I know
Speaker 1: a boner in the morning is normal. He can't know. Hey,
Speaker 1: the priest was basically like the criminal justice system. He's like,
Speaker 1: I know, you walked in and you saw this, but
Speaker 1: it's circumstantial evidence. But I also do respect that the
Speaker 1: priest was saying, like the brother I think was dead
Speaker 1: at this point, and so that the priest was saying.
Speaker 1: The thing that Domenico really needed to hear the priest
Speaker 1: was doctor Pertel. Yeah, yeah, Domenico's doctor Hotel didn't work
Speaker 1: as well for Domenico. But no, but I think it's
Speaker 1: really better that those of them um sought to unburden
Speaker 1: themselves of these kind of horrible secrets that had been
Speaker 1: making them very angry for so long. So she's brother
Speaker 1: past qualite. He's probably not having sex with the monkey,
Speaker 1: but it definitely loves this monkey very very much and
Speaker 1: takes it everywhere with him and demands that the monkey
Speaker 1: live in the house um so which they are building.
Speaker 1: So he is helping Domenico build a house in Three Rivers, Connecticut,
Speaker 1: which Domenico really really wants to be a homeowner in
Speaker 1: this town. And the plan is that they will marry
Speaker 1: two newly arrived eighteen year old Sicilian women and they'll
Speaker 1: both have a wife. And because the Dreaming isn't interested
Speaker 1: in that, he just wants staying out with his monkey.
Speaker 1: But Domenico thinks that'll be the thing that will make
Speaker 1: it normal, that'll make him forget about how much he
Speaker 1: loves his fat monkey. And one day well was sucking
Speaker 1: the monkey look I mean the five thing it was
Speaker 1: taking off his pants. We was weird. Was like, I
Speaker 1: would never have a wife over this monkey, like this money.
Speaker 1: It's just there was an implication that the monkey was
Speaker 1: his wife, whether it's sexually or not. Like if I
Speaker 1: don't think if you had like a cat or dog
Speaker 1: that you loved your significant other, was like, you have
Speaker 1: to choose me or the dog. Like people might choose
Speaker 1: the dog and that would be valid. Um, people love
Speaker 1: their pet. I don't know. I don't know if I
Speaker 1: would get rid of my cat based on a new boyfriend.
Speaker 1: I guess I I definitely think it's that's what the
Speaker 1: seid of, Like I will not have a wife, I
Speaker 1: will have this monkey in a cross stitch on someone's house.
Speaker 1: You'd be like, I gotta get out of this house. Yeah.
Speaker 1: He wasn't even trying to date and see if this
Speaker 1: woman maybe would be open to cohabiting with a monkey.
Speaker 1: He was just like, no wife, just a monkey. Okay,
Speaker 1: maybe I just didn't want to get married. That could
Speaker 1: be normal. That normal, like lots of people just you know,
Speaker 1: want to want to have a pet to live alone.
Speaker 1: That's okay, he's not sucking the monkey. I want to
Speaker 1: one of the things I love about you, Jennifer, as
Speaker 1: you always you do see the good in people, and
Speaker 1: you always look for the bright side. And I I
Speaker 1: also think that maybe he was having sex with them.
Speaker 1: Here's here's what I think on the monkey business. So um,
Speaker 1: the thing is it was twofold because Domenico was like,
Speaker 1: you will get rid of this monkey, and the monkey
Speaker 1: can maybe live outside, and you also have to get
Speaker 1: a wife. So I think that the two being intertwined
Speaker 1: for Domenico is what made them intertwined. For um, for
Speaker 1: Pascal or Pasquale, I don't know how you pronounce his name,
Speaker 1: but I think that ultimately, if there had been a
Speaker 1: woman who accepted the fact sort of someone like Likedessa,
Speaker 1: who was like who accepted Thomas and loved Thomas for
Speaker 1: who he was despite his flaws and the difficulty of
Speaker 1: having Thomas in her life, I think that somebody would
Speaker 1: have been like, Yes, this monkey is a part of
Speaker 1: our life for the rest of its natural life. And
Speaker 1: maybe it's not ideal, but I care about this person,
Speaker 1: and I see this person's gentleness and the love and
Speaker 1: care he has for that monkey, and if he can
Speaker 1: love and care for me in the same way, then
Speaker 1: we're good. Also, how to build on what you were saying,
Speaker 1: I think like maybe that relationship is just mirroring the
Speaker 1: thing about his mom and and Thomas. It's that like
Speaker 1: what Domenico saw and his brother was a tenderness that
Speaker 1: disgusted him, and that he saw something that was not
Speaker 1: manly or not representing like the ultimate man that his
Speaker 1: brother should have become. So like that is a I
Speaker 1: appreciate that read. And also maybe he has a weird
Speaker 1: relationship with the monkey and Yan. I think what's really
Speaker 1: important about that is what really I think made Domenico
Speaker 1: the maddest was the way other people perceived the relationship
Speaker 1: between Pasquale and the monkey. I think that Domenico is
Speaker 1: someone who was so um insecure in his own you know,
Speaker 1: worth the dominant that to have other people gossip about
Speaker 1: his brother and the monkey, he couldn't protect his brother
Speaker 1: the same way that you know, the mirrors the way
Speaker 1: that Dominic was always so humiliated by Thomas, and like
Speaker 1: I didn't know how to protect him that when people
Speaker 1: made fun of Thomas, rather than being like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: back off, that's my brother, he internalized that chain And
Speaker 1: I think Domenico. When people make fun of Pasquale, you know,
Speaker 1: even if it was just like joking, like kidding about
Speaker 1: he really internalized anger, crystallized Andy's uncle. Yeah, that's what
Speaker 1: I was gonna say. I also will say I think
Speaker 1: if Puss passwal I had not died, Prosperine would have
Speaker 1: been totally cool with living with a monkey. I think
Speaker 1: they would have had a really cool kind of sitcomy
Speaker 1: dynamic between postqualit, the monkey and Prosperine. I would have
Speaker 1: loved to see it. I think they would have had
Speaker 1: way more fun on their side of the house. Yes, absolutely, anyway,
Speaker 1: so that's a good transition into prospering and Violetta what
Speaker 1: are we gonna call her? Yoletta Ignasia. Melissa brings us
Speaker 1: into offering Agnasia. Well, we didn't talk about how pas
Speaker 1: died actually, which I think is super implant cover it
Speaker 1: real quick. So, um, the priest of the town and
Speaker 1: his underling, I'm not sure how that is exactly. Assistant
Speaker 1: priest uh to come to the house, cer like why
Speaker 1: aren't you coming to church? And they're still working on
Speaker 1: the house and uh, and they get into a fight
Speaker 1: because Domenico doesn't want to go to church and the
Speaker 1: priest Wall plus quality is up in a tree, I believe,
Speaker 1: trying to cross to like do some house work. I
Speaker 1: think his monkey is in a tree. Yeah, he gets
Speaker 1: bedeviled by blue jays and then on the roof putting
Speaker 1: on Yes, that's what it is. And so while they're
Speaker 1: in a fight, Domenico throws cement at the priest. It's
Speaker 1: a very silly fight, and then the priest curses the
Speaker 1: house and the monkey gets spooked at the same time
Speaker 1: by the birds get spooed because the monkey did get spooked,
Speaker 1: and the monkey jumps, and then Pascually tries to save
Speaker 1: the monkey, and the monkey is okay, but Pascual it
Speaker 1: falls to his death. Um, and it is very sad.
Speaker 1: And then, uh, much like the mother did with Dominic
Speaker 1: and Thomas promising to take care of Thomas, Domenico promises
Speaker 1: last dying breath to take care of the monkey, and
Speaker 1: he immediately fails that in a most terrific scene that
Speaker 1: just fails like actively, Yeah, well, I think he tries
Speaker 1: for like a day and then it's like nope, and
Speaker 1: uh kills the monkey and it really drowns the monkey.
Speaker 1: And it's very very upsetting because the monkey knows what's
Speaker 1: happening and I don't anyway, moving on from the monkey
Speaker 1: death from they couldn't you just give the monkey to
Speaker 1: someone else? The monkey totally responsibly his brother's Thomas's death.
Speaker 1: A lot of drowning in this book. God, so much drowning.
Speaker 1: But um, okay, So after that chapter of Domenico's life,
Speaker 1: he still has these brides, teenage brides waiting for him. Uh,
Speaker 1: with these with these Italian plumbers. Um, I thought that
Speaker 1: when I was reading. And then and they're like, come on,
Speaker 1: they can't wait for a long they're too hot to handle.
Speaker 1: And so he goes. He's so excited to meet these brides.
Speaker 1: He's gonna choose the eighteen year old one rather than
Speaker 1: the seventeen year old probably named Prosperine, and he's like waiting.
Speaker 1: I love this moment where he like starts at the
Speaker 1: feet like he looked. He literally pans up to the
Speaker 1: face and so he's like, oh, she's like a little skinny.
Speaker 1: I don't like that, and then sees her face and
Speaker 1: it's like she's ugly and old. She's like thirty. Um,
Speaker 1: I mean I think he's like thirty six or something anyway,
Speaker 1: and he's like horrified and angry and it's like, how
Speaker 1: dare you tricked me into this hag? And uh? Then god,
Speaker 1: I love the pipe and she's a She's like, I
Speaker 1: don't give a shit about you. Fine, thank god. And
Speaker 1: then um, Ignazia comes in and it Nausea is just
Speaker 1: the most beautiful woman he has ever seen. Is closer
Speaker 1: to eighteen, which is great for him. Um, and she
Speaker 1: doesn't want anything to do with Domenico. She's in love
Speaker 1: with a redheaded man. I forget what he does in
Speaker 1: the town. Um he lives with his mother and yeah,
Speaker 1: and so there's some deal making back and forth. He's
Speaker 1: like filled with lust for a nausea. Then finally he
Speaker 1: agrees instead of getting a dowry to pay for these
Speaker 1: women and and also take prospering, even though he didn't
Speaker 1: want to. Well at first, he actually he at first
Speaker 1: he also like bargains with the cousins and then to
Speaker 1: go home and then comes back because he's like because
Speaker 1: he's just yeah, he can't. He gets his ass on
Speaker 1: the train. It's also like the hilarious way that it's
Speaker 1: the first he's been so dedicated to working and building
Speaker 1: himself up as like a proper man in America in
Speaker 1: three rivers and he's like, this is the first time
Speaker 1: I've ever been horny in my hole. I can't believe it.
Speaker 1: I've never felt like this before, Like like all the
Speaker 1: energy is rushing through me and I can't contain myself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he was like a teenager, but in but a really
Speaker 1: problematic teenager because Ignazia wants nothing to do with him,
Speaker 1: and so drags these two sisters supposed sisters um to
Speaker 1: his house and they hate it and they don't like him,
Speaker 1: and Prospering is just like especially aggressive for Domenico and
Speaker 1: doesn't give a shit about him. Well, I think I
Speaker 1: think the one thing is on their wedding night, oh yes,
Speaker 1: which I think is the main thing that really crystallizes
Speaker 1: the relationship between Prospering and Yes Dominico. They have sex,
Speaker 1: she doesn't bleed right, and then he accuses her of
Speaker 1: not being a virgin and beats her even though she
Speaker 1: says she is. Uh, and it really sets a real
Speaker 1: tone for their whole relationship. Um. But the next morning,
Speaker 1: what I like is Prospering is really protective of Agnosia
Speaker 1: and he's like chopping onions or something. With a really
Speaker 1: big knife, like like a noticeably big knife, bigger than
Speaker 1: it has to be. And she's like, you ever lay
Speaker 1: a hand on her? I will, yes, yes, I think
Speaker 1: it was kind, but like it's implied and she's like yeah, oh,
Speaker 1: and she's kind of like I've done it before, bitch. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've killed a man. I've killed a man. Whatever, No
Speaker 1: you haven't. That can't be true. Uh, it turns out
Speaker 1: it is true. But we'll get to that momentarily. You're
Speaker 1: listening to Popcorn Book Clive for my Heart Radio. We'll
Speaker 1: be right back after this quick break, all right, So
Speaker 1: let's get back into it. So Ignazy gets pregnant and
Speaker 1: has or was pregnant. You don't know at the time.
Speaker 1: It's like I'm pregnant, I'm doing what do you do? Uh?
Speaker 1: March maybe February? Who knows these things anyway, don't pay
Speaker 1: attention to the date. I did the math. Actually it's
Speaker 1: seven months, right, Yeah, it's seven months. She was about
Speaker 1: twenty nine weeks because they got married in mid May
Speaker 1: and then the babies were born in early December, on
Speaker 1: December two, so that means like twenty nine weeks for
Speaker 1: the babies, which means that if they were born, and
Speaker 1: most twins are born early but not that early, they
Speaker 1: probably need time in the nikko for that um. But
Speaker 1: I will say everyone I was originally like conspiracy theory,
Speaker 1: it's definitely the Irishman's baby, but everyone says that he
Speaker 1: looks looks so much like Domenico, where I was just like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to suspend my disbelief and assume I is.
Speaker 1: I would say yeah, because at first I was like,
Speaker 1: that's what they're saying that, and then I'm like, oh no,
Speaker 1: because they're saying Domenico is actually his father, and that
Speaker 1: I feel like that was the real like it's not
Speaker 1: his grandfather, it's his father. But then now that I
Speaker 1: know that it's not either, I think he is the grandfather. Also,
Speaker 1: because my grandma has red hair and she did not
Speaker 1: have any red haired children, but her great grandchildren, three
Speaker 1: of them are redheads. It's like that Jane sticks the
Speaker 1: funk around, so I think, ah, there might have been
Speaker 1: some redheads. You also think that one of the seams
Speaker 1: of the book, he said, it's not just biology that
Speaker 1: makes a father. My father is someone who bears witness
Speaker 1: to your life, and the father is someone who's there,
Speaker 1: and um, I don't freaking debate whether or not that's
Speaker 1: entirely true, but um, I think that's how he comes
Speaker 1: to feel about Ray later, that Ray is not his
Speaker 1: natural father, but Ray it's his father, and you know,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe the same could be said of Domenico, and um,
Speaker 1: I think it's important to to make the distinction that
Speaker 1: like none of this, like that Dominico raped his wife,
Speaker 1: like none of the sex was ever consensual in an
Speaker 1: upsetting upsetting and the most upsetting thing is that like
Speaker 1: Dominic doesn't really grasp that in his explanation of his
Speaker 1: his grandfather's story to people, like that is so glossed
Speaker 1: over in a way that like make which makes him
Speaker 1: getting back with Sorry I'm jumping, but it makes him
Speaker 1: getting back with Dessa so upsetting to me because it
Speaker 1: feels like those conversations about consent and him being a
Speaker 1: rapist does not get talked about in the same way
Speaker 1: that we literally see every single conversation of every like
Speaker 1: every other conversation that Dominic has with people, the one
Speaker 1: that he has with Desa is the one we don't
Speaker 1: get to see, which I thought was like, yes, really really,
Speaker 1: I will say I will say Dominic does recognize some
Speaker 1: of the rape that happens, but it's not he doesn't
Speaker 1: recognize that all of it is non consensual from the
Speaker 1: second that Domenico bought right, Yeah, yeah, she wanted nothing
Speaker 1: to do with him. Yeah, and then I will say
Speaker 1: the one reprieve that Agnologia has in her life then
Speaker 1: is the birth of the twins is so traumatic on
Speaker 1: her body that the doctor is like, you literally cannot
Speaker 1: have sex with her anymore or she will die, Like
Speaker 1: if she gets pregnant again and has another baby, she
Speaker 1: will probably die. Which uh, then it becomes this like
Speaker 1: horribly brutal, vicious weapon that a story is so utterly tragic. Yeah. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: but so we go through this like he is mad.
Speaker 1: The twins come out, and it's a boy who's who's stillborn,
Speaker 1: and then a girl with red hair, and he fixates
Speaker 1: on this idea that the boy was his baby and
Speaker 1: the girl was the redheads, which again is not He
Speaker 1: is possible in like cats, but not possible in humans. Um,
Speaker 1: so that's just I think a thing that he believes
Speaker 1: but is not true. But he he fixates on it
Speaker 1: and believes that the daughter isn't his, which then goes
Speaker 1: into this main theme that Jennifer was talking about about,
Speaker 1: like raising someone else's child and what that means. Well,
Speaker 1: he literally treats her like a redheaded step child, like
Speaker 1: that is the yeah, but um, he talks about her
Speaker 1: being a Sicilian girl. Later when he talks about how
Speaker 1: she can keep secrets, she's she's a Sicilian. Um, it
Speaker 1: feels like maybe to love her he has to ultimately
Speaker 1: come to the belief that she is his, and he
Speaker 1: does point out later that there's resemblance there. And in
Speaker 1: the most horrible moment of you know, when Ignazia does
Speaker 1: die at the end that chapter for Dominico, it's like,
Speaker 1: and then I loved her, like it was so it's
Speaker 1: so awful, but it but that was when he began
Speaker 1: to love her, which is so insane. I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's it's just so terrible. It's almost like Connie chose
Speaker 1: him over her mother. Yeah, I mean she chose being
Speaker 1: a survivor. She chose because yeah, like Ignazia is like,
Speaker 1: I literally cannot take this anymore, which I understand because
Speaker 1: her life became a living hell. And then you know,
Speaker 1: Connie decided to be the stoic, brave one, which is
Speaker 1: so you know what I mean, Like, it's it's interesting
Speaker 1: because Dominic always saw his mother as a coward, and
Speaker 1: we see this really quiet form of courage in her
Speaker 1: and all she survived. Yeah, there's a thought that happened
Speaker 1: between do Medico oh that night. That night we get
Speaker 1: the story we were about to launch in just chands
Speaker 1: down my favorite part of the whole book. That is
Speaker 1: the best part of the whole book. Y'all told me
Speaker 1: in the group chat you were like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: prospering story. And I was like, okay, yeah, and then
Speaker 1: I got halfway through it. I was like, well that
Speaker 1: was wild. And then I realized, wait, there have been
Speaker 1: no rabbits yet. What And then the were rabbits and
Speaker 1: murder and the first time we get like a story
Speaker 1: from a woman's point of view and where I know
Speaker 1: it it's so exciting and from joy We did tiny bits.
Speaker 1: But I will say it's very interesting to me because
Speaker 1: we were talking about how at the end of the book,
Speaker 1: the feed the resolution of the female characters in Dominic's
Speaker 1: timeline feel very thin and like very much like they
Speaker 1: just served Dominic. But I will say, like, these are fun,
Speaker 1: well fleshed out, interesting female characters. I like, yeah, they're
Speaker 1: very cool, very complicated. Does anyone want to take um Prosperine? Well,
Speaker 1: one night, I think it's like after dinner, right, and
Speaker 1: they've the three of them, Dominico, Ignacia, and Prosperine have
Speaker 1: been living in this like terrible tension and unhappy house.
Speaker 1: And so Prosperine is getting fucking drunk off the wine
Speaker 1: that Dominico has and she starts, just for the first
Speaker 1: time ever, talking to him really like like having a
Speaker 1: full on conversation and telling telling him her story. And
Speaker 1: I know we're short on time, so I kind of
Speaker 1: want to just because there's so much going on. But
Speaker 1: it's a very rich text. It's a very but Prosperine
Speaker 1: grew up in a small Italian seaside town, right, and
Speaker 1: she is one of three daughters, and she's like having
Speaker 1: a great time hanging out with her sisters and her
Speaker 1: best friend, this woman named Violetta, and they're having a
Speaker 1: great time. Violetta is the daughter of a macaroni maker,
Speaker 1: and right, isn't it right? She's a fishmonger. Right, I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: I wasn't I was just laughing because Matt, daughter of
Speaker 1: a macaroni maker. It's just it's very funny to me.
Speaker 1: Prosperine is the daughter of a macaroni maker, and they
Speaker 1: see this woman in town who's kind of like positioned
Speaker 1: as the witchy, hunchbacked like they describe her as like
Speaker 1: having like a huge boil on her head, and she's
Speaker 1: like the witch of the town who like looks at
Speaker 1: everyone with an evil eye, and they make fun of
Speaker 1: her behind her back. But two Prosperines, you know, Dismay.
Speaker 1: She finds out that her father has actually sold her
Speaker 1: to this woman through this woman's son or godson, godson
Speaker 1: who happens to be like a famous artist who's doing
Speaker 1: stain glass like triptychs of old saints that he's trying
Speaker 1: to put together. And so she starts, she gets ripped
Speaker 1: away from her family, hates her dad for it, starts
Speaker 1: living with this woman and I think in the day
Speaker 1: that she moves to live with that woman, Violetta had
Speaker 1: gone with her, and that's when this artist meets Violetta,
Speaker 1: her best friend, and like falls in love with her
Speaker 1: but also is so creepy and non consensual about how
Speaker 1: that happens. But starts using Violetta as the model for
Speaker 1: his saints are like stained glass windows. She's his muse.
Speaker 1: She's his muse. That's the correct word. She's his muse.
Speaker 1: Fast forward and Violetta starts ignoring Prosperine, and Prosperine has
Speaker 1: now taken kind of the position of like the witchy
Speaker 1: person and the yeah, which in training, which in turn
Speaker 1: at this paid which he intern at this Italian seaside
Speaker 1: down um, and then so many things happened between that.
Speaker 1: But I think the big thing that that she shares
Speaker 1: is that Violetta goes away and comes back and it's
Speaker 1: clearly like has been abused, has been terribly treated by
Speaker 1: this artist husband of hers that they find that they
Speaker 1: actually ended up getting married, gets terribly abused, and that
Speaker 1: artist comes back home and moves back in to that
Speaker 1: old witchy person's house. Right yeah, I think, so stop
Speaker 1: passed away and the witch has passed away. Um, right side,
Speaker 1: there's a there's a weird moment unrelated to Violetta and
Speaker 1: the artist, where as the witch and training is the
Speaker 1: witch in turn, Um, she's prospering as watching the way
Speaker 1: you know, butcher animals for people in the town square
Speaker 1: and there's like me and school teacher comes and he's like, fun,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't buy one your rabbit. I could get twice
Speaker 1: as much meat from someone else. And the witch is like, oh, really,
Speaker 1: how about this? And she magically makes the one skinny
Speaker 1: rabbit turned into two skinny rabbits in half and it
Speaker 1: turns into two rabbits. Yeah, like King, what's his face?
Speaker 1: Was it? King Solomon? Yeah, that doesn't become two babies.
Speaker 1: But yeah, there is one other aside I want to
Speaker 1: say that I love in this section is that any
Speaker 1: time Domenico interrupts, Prosperine like punishes him by like being
Speaker 1: like I'm not gonna say anymore, and he's like, I
Speaker 1: don't care, wait tell me more, and like he just
Speaker 1: she just commands respect from him in a way that
Speaker 1: it's just tickled me so much, which the old witch
Speaker 1: lady taught her about. I find that there were there
Speaker 1: were two very um tender moments of like female not friendship,
Speaker 1: but like female connection. One describing the way that Prospering
Speaker 1: came to love this old woman who she had like
Speaker 1: originally mocked and found like terrifying in her disfigurement, Like
Speaker 1: eventually she would like touch the boil and find it
Speaker 1: very like sweet. And I just found the way that
Speaker 1: that was described really sweet. And then the fact that
Speaker 1: when they were a young women like Violetta, uh, they
Speaker 1: had been best friends. But Violetta is always like more
Speaker 1: beautiful and more flirtatious. And then when she becomes like
Speaker 1: the artist mused, she becomes like the popular girl in town,
Speaker 1: starts like ignoring uh, Prospering in a way that like
Speaker 1: is an ache to any girl who's had like a
Speaker 1: girl in high school become cool or whatever. But when
Speaker 1: she comes back, that relationship with Violetta and Prospering rekindles
Speaker 1: in a really intimate way. Even though that Violetta is like,
Speaker 1: I'm the mistress of this house, I'm the boss, but
Speaker 1: there's still that like Prospering still cares for her so
Speaker 1: much because they still have that base of female friendship.
Speaker 1: It's such a complicated, toxic, like kind of toxic relationship
Speaker 1: between the two of them because Violetta continues to wield
Speaker 1: this like popular girl, I'm the woman of the house
Speaker 1: kind of you know, energy towards Prospering the whole time,
Speaker 1: and it kind of ebbs and flows throughout and even
Speaker 1: despite that, Prospering is like, you know, I've seen I
Speaker 1: feel like Prosperine is so tender because she's like, I've
Speaker 1: seen how much you've suffered. I'm going to continue to
Speaker 1: be good to you and help you well. Prosperine is
Speaker 1: the only person she has any power over, Like, Um,
Speaker 1: she's in a situation where she's so brutalized by everybody else.
Speaker 1: Her husband beats her every single night. Um, Like, the
Speaker 1: only way she can cling to the old remnants of
Speaker 1: like being bold and popular and beautiful is to be like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm the mistress of this house, and you take care
Speaker 1: of me. That's the only person she can do that
Speaker 1: too in her entire life. I just I found prosperinges
Speaker 1: like devotion very touching. The fact that she's like, even
Speaker 1: when you're mean to me, like even like you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm going to protect you because you need to be protected. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Prosperine like she's not being beaten by anybody. Um, Prospering
Speaker 1: Is has infinitely more freedom at least in that regard
Speaker 1: than Violetta does. And I think Prosperine is probably aware
Speaker 1: of that that she doesn't have to answer to any husband. Um,
Speaker 1: she gets to sit around and spoke her pipe and
Speaker 1: sell rabbits and sexual violence again and she is not
Speaker 1: righted constantly. Yeah, and to kind of build on that protection,
Speaker 1: prospering and Violetta kind of put this plan together to
Speaker 1: murder the artist's husband by feeding like shards of glass
Speaker 1: to him. Um, and that ends up like ripping his
Speaker 1: insides apart, and he like dies a horrible graphic death.
Speaker 1: But the funny like whoopsie daisies, three stooges aspect of
Speaker 1: this is that they had left food out when the
Speaker 1: priest because of the priest or the doctors doctor, that's right,
Speaker 1: the doctor decides that he died of a burst of
Speaker 1: pandex first of all. Yeah, and there's like a sigh
Speaker 1: of relief of like, why we pulled it off. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we got away with the murder. And then they like
Speaker 1: turn into the kitchen and he's just like spoon feeding himself.
Speaker 1: This like the chicken. The chickens stuffed with glass shards
Speaker 1: and lead water. They also include lead water. Right. You
Speaker 1: know what, if you're going to poison someone, just make
Speaker 1: sure you have one dish and save all the other
Speaker 1: dishes and put them away because doctors will come and
Speaker 1: check it out and eat it. That was the last
Speaker 1: and then catch him because I think as he's dying,
Speaker 1: he his wife finds like glass shards and his Yeah,
Speaker 1: the doctor doesn't die because he just has the one meal.
Speaker 1: So the wife like looks in the chamberpot. She's like,
Speaker 1: wait a second, this is shining. So they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: these two girls murdered them. They go on the run.
Speaker 1: They go they start like trying to work, um and
Speaker 1: you know, Violette as a tough time and they work
Speaker 1: as a as laundresses and then they have a scheme
Speaker 1: to get fake passports uh and to be on the run.
Speaker 1: And she gets really subsidized by Bye prosperins father, which
Speaker 1: was very weirdly, I think because they're so little touching things.
Speaker 1: It was very touching of like he she realized her
Speaker 1: father always left her, even though it was complicated the
Speaker 1: way he behaved through all that. But although there are
Speaker 1: worst lives, worst lives for like an unattractive daughter who
Speaker 1: maybe wouldn't be married in this town economy than to
Speaker 1: be a witchy intern. Yeah yeah, yeah, like no, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think if if not for violed is incredibly abusive husband,
Speaker 1: Breastbine could have had a very good life as kind
Speaker 1: of the town. Which, yeah, like you, I had so
Speaker 1: much sympathy empathy for the father because like, that's what
Speaker 1: you had to do in those times, sort of right,
Speaker 1: You had to get your macaroni store and you get
Speaker 1: the money from it. He sold the macaroni store. I
Speaker 1: think the father also chose her because he knew that
Speaker 1: she was the one who could handle herself. And also
Speaker 1: I think that she was the least attractive conventionally attractive
Speaker 1: of her sisters, and he knew that she was probably
Speaker 1: less likely to get raped if she was given to
Speaker 1: this artist to serve in his household, which just really
Speaker 1: hurt me that he had to think about that and
Speaker 1: that that was a consideration. He's like, no, you're going
Speaker 1: to do a great job, and you're homely and you're
Speaker 1: good at work. M h um. And I mean as
Speaker 1: as I think we find out later, Preferring has no
Speaker 1: interest in being married to a man that is not
Speaker 1: on her list of goals in life. Um, it seems
Speaker 1: much better for her to take a job where she
Speaker 1: will not have to do that. Yeah. Also happy pride, prosperinge, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: which then, as we find out colors her relationship with Violetta,
Speaker 1: that her protectiveness was not only uh, female friendship, but
Speaker 1: romantic love. I mean she said pretty early on that
Speaker 1: she had nice tips. So yeah, Domicos like, you talked
Speaker 1: like a man, and he's like, no, not could that be.
Speaker 1: But hotly for furthering the stereotype that lesbians are, which
Speaker 1: is whiches or carpenters, which is occupation. That's the binary.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so Prospering tells Domenico that Theoletta died in
Speaker 1: the Old Country. Funny, he really, she really comically realizes
Speaker 1: that she needs to backtrack, that she's telling the story.
Speaker 1: And then he's like, wait, both of you, both of
Speaker 1: you came to America. What She's like, No, I said,
Speaker 1: just me. She dead? Yeah. She has two explanations. First
Speaker 1: of all, she says, she's she's dead, and then she says, um,
Speaker 1: she married the lawyer. She married the lawyer who got
Speaker 1: us the passport, so it was fine. And she says,
Speaker 1: I thought you said she was dead, and she's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right, she married the lawyer. And and also it
Speaker 1: was like and she's she was almost as beautiful than that.
Speaker 1: She has now now I thought you said she said,
Speaker 1: I mean she would have been anyway she was. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I didn't see her. An hour ago became
Speaker 1: very clear that the Aletta was in fact Ignazia in
Speaker 1: a way that that I love that. Even Dominico, it's
Speaker 1: so like dumb that he so he kind of angrily
Speaker 1: just doesn't want to believe it and also wouldn't think
Speaker 1: that's rad of his wife. Where you're abusing someone and
Speaker 1: you find out that they murdered the last person who
Speaker 1: abused them, that would not be rad for you. I
Speaker 1: guess if I was married to be Aletta, I would
Speaker 1: be like that was rad. Any of us were married
Speaker 1: to Aletta much better than her. Life of Domenico is.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Popcorn book Club for my Heart Radio,
Speaker 1: and we'll be back right after the break. Okay, we're
Speaker 1: back with Popcorn book Club. I haven't watched the HBO
Speaker 1: adaptation yet, but I want to find this scene in
Speaker 1: it better exist of its episode five. I haven't gotten
Speaker 1: there yet. I watched the first four episodes, so I
Speaker 1: actually finished right at the return of Nedra Frank. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so right, she's dropping the thing on him, which he
Speaker 1: did not drop on his foot. She like put it
Speaker 1: on him a little forcefully, but not in the comical
Speaker 1: way that happened in the book. I find a brief aside.
Speaker 1: I found the show hard to watch because because the
Speaker 1: things that are described in the book are really brutal,
Speaker 1: but there's a certain distance of it just being text.
Speaker 1: We're like seeing someone saw through their hand. They show
Speaker 1: the show it, they don't show it in close up,
Speaker 1: for which I am very grateful thing. But then it
Speaker 1: PAMs up his stump. No I, I screamed, oh good, okay,
Speaker 1: I live alone. Didn't I don't know if that's something
Speaker 1: wrong with me or I live alone? And so no one.
Speaker 1: I wasn't like with anyone saying it, but the sound
Speaker 1: out of my mouth was okay. Back to the story,
Speaker 1: he's Domenico's reaction is like, this sucks. I now live
Speaker 1: with a murderer. I want to get her out of
Speaker 1: my house. Well, he's like, yeah, you're right. This doesn't
Speaker 1: end well for the abuser, and then he refuses to
Speaker 1: eat anything. And it's weird that that's not like a
Speaker 1: cautionary tale for him of like, I better be nice
Speaker 1: to these ladies. Don't kill me. You know, he just
Speaker 1: he just eats his food outside of and puts his
Speaker 1: dresser in front of his door. But he's still sleeping
Speaker 1: with Ignace, which is probably a huge relief for her. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so one reprieve in her life, I know, but instead
Speaker 1: starts sleeping with a teenager at the like it's a secretary. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: start sleeping with teenaged like sex worker and then down
Speaker 1: to the secretary. You also that sex workers. Seemed like
Speaker 1: maybe she was also an intern because she was sweeping
Speaker 1: when he came in. He thought that she was going
Speaker 1: to take him to his lady of the evening, and
Speaker 1: then she was his teenager, she's a secret and he
Speaker 1: was like, man, she was so young. Anyway, I continued
Speaker 1: to funck only her just such a wretched man. I
Speaker 1: feel like, when when this is justice for At the beginning,
Speaker 1: when Nidro was like, don't give this to your mom, yeah,
Speaker 1: Nature was like he's the worst and awful and this
Speaker 1: is a bad gift for your mother. Yeah. No, Nedro
Speaker 1: was like a hundred percent correct, and she was she
Speaker 1: was trying to protect Connie and Dominic and definitely not Domenico.
Speaker 1: I think that she was like, he's horrible I hate this.
Speaker 1: He's toxic, but I need to protect this lady because
Speaker 1: she does not need to know in her last that
Speaker 1: her father hated her mother. Yeah, routinely. Okay, I can't
Speaker 1: believe that I'm going to mount any kind of defensive Domenica,
Speaker 1: who you know, is very, very bad. He's a bad person.
Speaker 1: But the one thing that did make me feel a
Speaker 1: little bit of sympathy for him was this woman does
Speaker 1: not want to marry him, but he says she will
Speaker 1: see my house and she will love me. And I
Speaker 1: think he is so limited by his perceptions of what
Speaker 1: a good man and a good husband would be of
Speaker 1: Like I did the thing. I came to America. I
Speaker 1: worked really hard, I built house. That is what it
Speaker 1: means to be a good man, and my reward for
Speaker 1: that it will be being loved. And he just doesn't
Speaker 1: have any of the tools for how you actually create
Speaker 1: a relationship through communication and through tenderness and through gentlenes
Speaker 1: us that maybe she's brother, Frankly had more of brother,
Speaker 1: both brothers, like I don't know. Vince seemed pretty fun,
Speaker 1: how he seemed good with women like he seems he
Speaker 1: seemed to be giving them a pretty good time. It's
Speaker 1: like it is a tragedy too, and that I feel
Speaker 1: like that's what Dominic gets out of reading this book.
Speaker 1: He's like that tragedy of what masculinity is in Dominico's mind,
Speaker 1: which is like build a house, have a wife, make
Speaker 1: an income, be loved. That's how it works. Well, it's
Speaker 1: it's also being he had these dreams of being like
Speaker 1: revered and widely adored, and he had all these like
Speaker 1: that word Dominic cause he's a grandiose like he was.
Speaker 1: He had this big view of himself. But you could
Speaker 1: see it's like it all came back to his father
Speaker 1: who had the metal and had to give it away,
Speaker 1: and that he gets this metal, you know it all.
Speaker 1: But it's and then when the mayor like is like,
Speaker 1: oh these you know, Italian immigrants ruined everything, and you know,
Speaker 1: it feels it is tragic. It's he's a but he's
Speaker 1: a very flawed bad man. But it's a tragic story. Um,
Speaker 1: he does get that. The one happy moment I guess
Speaker 1: for everyone is when he kind of he goes back
Speaker 1: to the church and he confesses, um about among other things,
Speaker 1: he's he's terrible worried that his brother was fucking a monkey,
Speaker 1: and um, the priest navigates it really, really nicely, and
Speaker 1: the priest also tells him that he has to humble
Speaker 1: himself and that one way he can do that is
Speaker 1: he can start writing down what's happened to him and
Speaker 1: he can start, you know, considering how those things shaped him.
Speaker 1: And sadly, the only way to Menico knows how to
Speaker 1: do that is to couch it in the guys of
Speaker 1: being a guide for Italian young men of how to
Speaker 1: be great like me that because I'm so awesome. So um,
Speaker 1: he's not really able to humble himself, but it is
Speaker 1: a kind of therapy. So then just to fast forward
Speaker 1: bullet point through the next few plot points, which I
Speaker 1: might get the order wrong, but he basically sends Prospering.
Speaker 1: He calls the monkey to work at the boarding house
Speaker 1: like five or six days a week, and that's sort
Speaker 1: of their new stasis until they he catches Prospering and
Speaker 1: Ignausia trying to run away to New York, and he
Speaker 1: uses the classic Tempesta strategy to get them back, which
Speaker 1: is a weaponizing policeman, and he makes his peace with
Speaker 1: the church, and um, the head of the church asks
Speaker 1: him to volunteer his time for free to help build
Speaker 1: a school, and it's kind of the only nice moment
Speaker 1: for everybody in his life that you know, he about
Speaker 1: how like God, I'm giving away millions of dollars essentially
Speaker 1: to do this for free and free advice. But it
Speaker 1: makes him really happy, like he gets to build something good.
Speaker 1: And when they have a ceremony to open the school,
Speaker 1: the priest who knows about his father's medal, um says
Speaker 1: that this wouldn't have happened without Domenico Tempesta and he
Speaker 1: gives him a medal, and his wife is really proud
Speaker 1: of him, and his daughter collapse and says Papa, Papa,
Speaker 1: and it's probably the best day of his life. Yes,
Speaker 1: and then he has his medal. I think something that's
Speaker 1: also important is the catalyst for them running away to
Speaker 1: New York is the fact that in a fit of rage,
Speaker 1: Domenico was like a slam a door and he slammed
Speaker 1: it on Connie's finger. And Um, the reason he is
Speaker 1: here is is because Prospering spits on his medal and
Speaker 1: tells him that his medal is dumb because hear it
Speaker 1: every single week, but it means a lot to him,
Speaker 1: like it does. It has great sent him told, but
Speaker 1: also he sucks whatever. He slams Connie's fingers by accident,
Speaker 1: but it's even like too proud and too angry to
Speaker 1: even say it was an accident or apologize or even
Speaker 1: like he does. He does slam it by accident, but
Speaker 1: it's in a fit of rage or just not an accident.
Speaker 1: And I feel like that's important to clarify because a
Speaker 1: lot of abuse that happens in homes is like, oh,
Speaker 1: it was an accident that I punched this wall and
Speaker 1: scared you, or I didn't mean to like knock over
Speaker 1: this chair and hit you. Raises the same thing later
Speaker 1: about raking Connie's arm. Yes, it's just an accident. Yes,
Speaker 1: thank you for that clarification. So uh Nausea and Prospering
Speaker 1: do the very smart thing of getting the hell out
Speaker 1: of there, away from this incredibly abusive man, starting over
Speaker 1: with almost no money, which is very scary because all
Speaker 1: uh they do is he just whenever she needs to
Speaker 1: buy something, he gives her the exact chain age, which
Speaker 1: is as Domenico even comments, I mean, he doesn't couch
Speaker 1: it this way, but it is an act of abuse
Speaker 1: and control because then she doesn't have income to to
Speaker 1: be independent to leave him. Oh yeah, no, I mean
Speaker 1: I think, um, it's not a form of abuse that's
Speaker 1: talked about very often, but I think men who really
Speaker 1: really limit their wives finances enough that they could never
Speaker 1: leave that is a form of abuse. And then, uh,
Speaker 1: the boarding house lady tips him off. He beats them
Speaker 1: to the train station, and like I said, weaponized systemic sexism, racism,
Speaker 1: classic Tempesta move. Befriends the policeman and pretends like he's
Speaker 1: just picking someone up and he's like, and if I
Speaker 1: need something, I'll just I'll just wave. He confronts them,
Speaker 1: they get on the train. He threatens them with the police. Uh,
Speaker 1: and Ignazia gets scared because she thinks that Connie is
Speaker 1: going to be taken away from her. I mean, maybe justifiably,
Speaker 1: because as we see later, Domenico is very ruthless and awful,
Speaker 1: and Prospering gets on the I'm gonna bullpoint because we
Speaker 1: have so much to cover, so I'm gonna skip over,
Speaker 1: and I want to talk about the show too. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: Prospering Uh gets on the train, Ignasia comes back with Connie,
Speaker 1: and then you know, there's a new stasis for a
Speaker 1: little while until he catches Prospering back in the house
Speaker 1: back from New York, having sex with Ignazia, and we
Speaker 1: realized that there was this relationship there all along, and
Speaker 1: that you know, that was sort of the only intimacy
Speaker 1: that they had had. He's furious. He locks Prospering up
Speaker 1: in an insane asylum. Settle, Yeah, with Settle, that's the
Speaker 1: Settle gets her in the insane asylum and then begins
Speaker 1: really viciously basically torturing Ignasia by having sex with her
Speaker 1: ending like and then as she's falling asleep, whispering in
Speaker 1: her ear like, I hope I got you pregnant. It
Speaker 1: bursts your heart and it kills Yeah, that's what you
Speaker 1: just horrified. The added detail of that he like waits
Speaker 1: for her breath and sobbing to subside, and like waits
Speaker 1: for her almost to fall asleep, like that is the
Speaker 1: unsettling moment of cruelty that like chilled my blood. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I and after torturing, being tortured by this abusive
Speaker 1: rapist who institutionalized her lover and only friend in the world, Uh,
Speaker 1: she takes Connie and uh, well, she commits suicide by
Speaker 1: going into the pond below the ice um. But she
Speaker 1: attempted to bring Connie along with her and make it
Speaker 1: a murder suicide. But there's a sign of struggle and
Speaker 1: and and Connie escaped and ran away from her mother
Speaker 1: and comes back to to Domenico. Also she poisoned a dog,
Speaker 1: got a dog, really and she's not allowed to have
Speaker 1: any friends Americans. But even the woman who runs the
Speaker 1: boarding house, the Italian woman, it's like, oh, your wife
Speaker 1: doesn't come to see me lately, Like why is that?
Speaker 1: And of what she does not say is because I'm
Speaker 1: not allowing courtesy, because that was like especially painful was
Speaker 1: that because of that too, She like didn't get a
Speaker 1: chance to practice English, didn't get a chance to practice
Speaker 1: like Italian dining, reading anything. It was just like a
Speaker 1: complete isolation and cutting off, cutting her off of like
Speaker 1: any resources whatsoever, just like completely dehumanizing this woman. You
Speaker 1: can't be friends with any American. Well, you can talk.
Speaker 1: It reminded me of what happened was Ray and Connie
Speaker 1: that when they go to the movies and they have
Speaker 1: a bad experience on the bus, she tells her kids,
Speaker 1: you you can't talk about it because Ray won't let
Speaker 1: us go to the movies anymore. Well, and um, that's
Speaker 1: that's not something her husband should have control over. That's
Speaker 1: that's a call you should be allowed to make on
Speaker 1: your own it. Um. It reminded me. It's a little
Speaker 1: later in the book, but I highlighted it of like, uh,
Speaker 1: when it's about the gang Green raised Gangreen that has
Speaker 1: to cut off because it's dead, and says, you know,
Speaker 1: I keep on talking about starved something long enough and
Speaker 1: it dies. And he keeps on talking about how Domenico
Speaker 1: eventually died of starving, like he starved himself and he
Speaker 1: but he also starved Ignasia and you know, all of
Speaker 1: and Thomas was starved. It's like everyone in this book
Speaker 1: was starved of their needs. Um. And that's how all
Speaker 1: of them collectively and individually. That was like the theme
Speaker 1: of all and Deessa specifically even says that like you,
Speaker 1: you sucked all the ac I can't. I can't breathe.
Speaker 1: It's like she that marriage died of starvation too, because
Speaker 1: Dominic was incapable of giving her the emotional support and
Speaker 1: affection that she needed after their daughter died. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: woof that is uh. And then the story basically and
Speaker 1: Domenico story basically, and you know, Connie grows up and
Speaker 1: he's like, and I loved her, and I'm a man
Speaker 1: of the town and I'm great, uh, and everything's wonderful
Speaker 1: and it's fine. And he said he loved her because
Speaker 1: he didn't tell anyone what happened. He was good at
Speaker 1: keeping secrets, and in that moment, I loved her, Like
Speaker 1: was the reason he also liked me to eat cigarettes.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think his perspective of love is still
Speaker 1: so yeah, he doesn't he doesn't have a it's not
Speaker 1: a happy story about a single father. Now. It's not like, Wow,
Speaker 1: the young are really changed from that point on. It
Speaker 1: was just a wacky l family comedy. His own story.
Speaker 1: He interrupts his own story several times. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: my ugly daughter came over to make me lunch like
Speaker 1: an asshole old and she keeps telling me to lie
Speaker 1: down and take a nap, and I'm like, bitch, bring
Speaker 1: me an onion. Literally something that happened. But the story
Speaker 1: ends with Dominic not getting the answer that he wants,
Speaker 1: which is he was reading this whole thing hoping that
Speaker 1: it would either have the horrific reveal that Dominico raped
Speaker 1: Connie and that the man that he thought was his
Speaker 1: grandfather was actually either just his father or also his
Speaker 1: father um or who his real father was. So he
Speaker 1: doesn't get that, and so he's like, oh, well, this sucks.
Speaker 1: It was like what was the point of reading? But
Speaker 1: so that's that's uh, oh my god. There's so much
Speaker 1: in the six I don't even know we're gonna even
Speaker 1: tackle dominic scited story. And I do want to say
Speaker 1: something about the Domenico story. The last thing um he
Speaker 1: talks a lot about, which is this like Sicilian silence
Speaker 1: and stoicness that exists, and this for him is the
Speaker 1: closest he's ever come to breaking this silence. And I
Speaker 1: think that it's interesting that he made all the arrangements
Speaker 1: for his own burial and his own death preparation, which
Speaker 1: is just like so type a um and on his
Speaker 1: headstone it says the greatest griefs are silent. Yeah. He
Speaker 1: talks about sort of how all of this grief existed
Speaker 1: in him in that way, but that he kept it
Speaker 1: silent and he maintained ota unlike the people in the
Speaker 1: north of Italy who were just like talking about how
Speaker 1: they feel all the time. M hm. And I feel
Speaker 1: like Dominic sort of maybe epigenetically has inherited this opta
Speaker 1: and the then we talked a little bit about how
Speaker 1: the happy ending for him could have just been him
Speaker 1: going to therapy and sort of breaking this silence, and
Speaker 1: in a way, it's really good that he did do that,
Speaker 1: and as well, I think it's something that affects every
Speaker 1: man that we really learn a lot about in the
Speaker 1: course of this book, This idea that you can't talk
Speaker 1: about your feelings, you have to be strong all the time,
Speaker 1: and how incredibly harmful and toxic and sometimes deadly that
Speaker 1: can be to those people. Um that it doesn't just
Speaker 1: cause pain for all the women around them, although it does,
Speaker 1: um it causes so much personal internal pain for them
Speaker 1: as well. That's our show for the week. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much for listening. I'm Danish Schwartz and you can
Speaker 1: find me on Twitter at Danish Swartz with three z's.
Speaker 1: You can follow Jennifer Wright at Jen Ashley Right Drama.
Speaker 1: Donqua is at Garama Drama, Melissa Hunter is at Melissa
Speaker 1: f t W and Tan Tran is smart enough to
Speaker 1: have gotten off Twitter, but she is on Insta at
Speaker 1: Pink Tina. Our Executive producer is Christopher Hasiotis, and We're
Speaker 1: produced and edited by Mike Johns. Special thanks to David Wasserman.
Speaker 1: Still to come. The exciting conclusion of I Know this
Speaker 1: much is true the Home Game edition, when Ralph is like, Hey,
Speaker 1: you need to get your brother tested for HIV, I
Speaker 1: was like trauma, Bingo, here we go. That's what I'm
Speaker 1: waiting for. Popcorn book Club is a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio