SLEEPING WITH FISHES

A collection of personal essays waxes about a man’s Italian American experiences.

Fiorito took Italian in high school, then went home and tried to speak the language to his Sicilian grandparents. They spoke back to him in Sicilian, which was so little like the language he was learning in school, he couldn’t make any sense of it. “Words truncated, or just completely different,” he remembers. “The grammar is so mangled I can’t decipher the meanings.” The experience reflects a theme that comes up again and again in the author’s collection: the extent to which being an Italian American is grasping forever at a past just out of reach. Fiorito’s subjects are frequently the last surviving vestiges of Italian New York City: the last gift shop in Little Italy, the vanishing Italian bakeries of Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. The same trend plays out on a familiar level as he recalls trying to connect with his dead father by exploring the music the man once loved or attempting to navigate his octogenarian mother’s failing health. Ironically, in attempting to document these developments, the author feels he’s betraying that same heritage, particularly in regard to those closest to him. “And so now I am the Fredo of the family,” he says, referencing the famously loose-lipped Corleone brother in The Godfatherand The Godfather II. “The snitch. I say things. I write things. You have to understand that this tradition of keeping your mouth shut is very old. It goes back centuries.” Fiorito’s prose is crisp and full of personality. If it sometimes drifts into a sentimental register, the writing never feels inauthentic to his voice. These 23 essays are short, often under five pages, and range from journalistic pieces about individuals or businesses to ruminations on the immigrant experience and humorous reimaginings of a secret cabal of pizza makers stretching back to Jesus. The strongest essays are those dealing with the author’s family, particularly his mother, who steps off the page as a larger-than-life devil’s advocate, seeming to dispute or complicate every point her son tries to make. Italian Americans, particularly those of Fiorito’s generation, will likely find much here to relate to, laugh at, and maybe even mourn.

An enjoyable ode to Italian American families.