The true story of a remarkable woman, Addis Amicarella, who was born in the small commune of Acciano high above the Aterno River valley just before the outbreak of the Second World War. As one in a family of six, life was hard; you had to be tough to survive.
At the age of only fifteen and speaking no English, she left to travel to Ireland in a bid to make a better life for her family. Finding work as a general dogsbody in a hotel there, she was soon able to send money home to Italy.
But Addis was a keen learner and was always determined to move her life forward. From Italy to Ireland, from London to Yorkshire with a few stops on the way, this kind, pragmatic, decisive woman proves that there is life ‘Beyond the Aterno...'
ISBN : 978-1-78830-246-3
Published: 27/06/2019
Pages : 287
Size : 205x140mm
Imprint : Olympia Publishers
Feeling that I might have already taken on more than my fair share of life's challenges, the enterprise of writing a biography, or any sort of book, for the first time, did seem quite an unusual thing to find myself doing in my mid-fifties. Though it has been a thoroughly rewarding new experience and one which I would like to try to develop in future years, it's always a difficult question being asked where my writing influences come from, because an ailing family business permanently suspended me from scholarly life at the age of sixteen, and limited my academic background to a very ordinary level public school education. While I hope my writing shows, that even this may still have been a great benefit for me to have had, I have little doubt that my Irish-Italian extraction also played a part in planting an imagination in my consciousness, long before my writing days began to dawn.