David Downie Discusses “Red Riviera” with Don George
A discussion about Italy, globetrotting, and crime from two of travel writing's greatest minds.
Its jaws open wide, a firefighting seaplane skims the glittering Gulf of Portofino on Italy’s jagged Ligurian coast, scooping up seawater, unlucky anchovies and a lone swimmer named Joe Gary. The superrich, retired Italian-American spook has mob connections and a dirty political past. Has he been snatched by accident or murdered?
Red Riviera is Commissioner Daria Vinci’s first investigation, a wild roller-coaster ride from the tangled trails of the Cinque Terre to glamorous Portofino and roughneck, roistering Genoa. It’s a Riviera made red by riotous bougainvillea—and the blood spilling from bags stuffed with butchered bodies.
Half-American, Daria Vinci is an outsider, the unlikely rising star of Genoa’s secretive Special Operations Directorate DIGOS. In Red Riviera, she must face down a Fascist police chief and fanatical coup-plotter, the CIA’s creepy local mastermind, a former World War Two Spitfire fighter pilot, and a plucky hundred-year-old marquise whose memory is as long as it is vengeful. If you like Aurelio Zen, Aimee Leduc, and Inspector Brunetti, you won’t be able to put down this captivating first adventure of Commissioner Daria Vinci.
Week One of National Poetry Month 2019
National Poetry Month is upon us! This year ASP has decided to celebrate by featuring several poems each week curated by different members of the ASP team. Now that the first week is over, let’s take a look back at the poets and poems we have featured thus far.
Craving More Grace? Check out the Poet Laureate on the NEA’s “Art Works”
Craving more Grace Cavalieri? Of course you are! Maryland’s newest Poet Laureate is active, about, and spreading the word; that is, her words. Even though Poet Laureate is largely an honorary position (it is unpaid, and one is “honored” more with a title than a job much like a knighthood or a medal of freedom), Grace Cavalieri seems determined to become the most active and community-focused Poet Laureate in Maryland’s history. Recently she was featured on Art Works the official podcast for the National Endowment for the Arts.
Grace Cavalieri’s Interview on Midday with Tom Hall
Grace Cavalieri stopped by WYPR last week for an interview on “Midday” with Tom Hall. The Poet Laureate and author of ASP’s Other Voices, Other Lives, mused on her life and work, meditating on the loss of her late husband, and reading from her deep poetry catalog. This interview is well worth the 40 minutes it takes to impart the important wisdom of one of Maryland’s foremost sages.