Not Americans, not "Negroes" but "The Middle People" ... are the Italians who emigrated to the United States in the early 1900s.

The novel by Mimmo Gangemi, published by Piemme, tells the story, dreams and destinies of the Rubbini family, who set out from Sicily in search of the future, 24 days by ship, overseas. Initially, the head of the family Masi seems to be the protagonist of Gangemi's opera, who almost immediately leaves the scene to his eldest son Tony who, in turn, gives way, but only towards the end of the novel, to his younger brother Luigi. Two intertwined stories that alternate from New Orleans to New York and then again from New York to New Orleans. Two extremely different souls that offer us as many perspectives regarding times, places and events.

"Now they would have to continue alone in that land that raged on innocence, where there were thorns and brambles, the roses and flowers with which he enticed the emigrants. They would have managed despite the few years, Tony was weaned to life, and he would have guided Luigi's steps to the piano”.

The theater is that of the East Coast, between New Orleans and New York, between the cotton fields and the railway yards, between Little Italy and Hart Island.

The America of the time seen through their eyes and told, at first, through family history, which then focuses on individual stories.

Gangemi talks to us about cultures and civilizations that coexist, badly, each with their own events. Their fears and sufferings, in a foreign and hostile land that does not accept them, exploits them, strengthened by a society deprived of rights, in which blacks, that's right, not blacks but blacks, were treated like beasts. The southern Italians who "didn't appear so white", were in turn discriminated against by the immigrants themselves ... "they insult us blacks because we are the middle people, neither white and nor blacks. They do not like Italians. They do not like newcomers. They have lived here before and feel better”.

A strong character, Tony, who enters quietly, in the shadow of his father's charisma, as well as his authority, as it was in those days, only to become the undisputed protagonist of this fantastic novel by Gangemi.

Thus, between poverty, malaria, prostitution, summary justice, prevarication, search for redemption, war, mafia and anarchy, the events of the Masi family unfold. In the background the intense notes of nascent jazz, a promising means of redemption for Luigi, who always remains a stranger to the sad fate of a large part of the family, as if not wanting to get involved, not wanting to admit, not wanting to know. Watching, Luigi, albeit with suffering, at the affairs of his beloved brother, but carrying on his existence as he proceeds by finding the ransom that life denies to the other members of the family.

 Therefore, the diversity of the two brothers stands out, Tony who never accepts America, a combative and vindictive spirit, who attributes the dramatic fate of his parents to her, and Luigi who, instead, sees the States as an opportunity, right path right away. He builds his life path, Luigi, looking for and finding a small space in a land populated by prejudice, in search of a redemption and a future that only the trumpet, combined with his talent, can provide him.

Compelling pages of true history, for a journey into the past with respect to a phenomenon that is not dead but has only changed its perspective. Italians, from emigrants in search of hospitality and fortune, with a firm heart at home and the desire for a brighter future, to hosts who are sometimes forgetful, sometimes merciless and uncompromising. 

Thus, all the characters proceed with their lives but with a fixed thought in mind, the return to their homeland. So America not as a final destination but as a means for overcoming a state of profound poverty and dissatisfaction but which condemns its immigrants (not all) to even more poverty, even more dissatisfaction. A mirage for Masi, "How far must a father go, to give his children a future?” The dream of retracing one's steps, the utopia of returning with a different status. A dream through which Gangemi unites, with the exception of Luigi, all his characters, albeit profoundly different, which inevitably affect the different and tragic destinies that destiny has reserved for them.

"America had cost dearly. And their family had cost America dearly " 

Here is another novel born from the skillful and successful pen of Gangemi that leaves no doubts as to the possibility of replicating the success of his previous titles, one above all "The petty judge", which has become a TV series, which has seen the main interpreter Luca Zingaretti.

The novel captivates and fascinates by keeping curiosity alive, involving the reader from the first to the last line and which, above all, leaves nothing in suspense, giving the expected final satisfaction, after an engaging journey through the American dream no that unfolds chapter after chapter.