Journalist and novelist Linda Stasi’s new book, “The Descendant,” is a historical fiction novel set to be released on March 10 by Regalo Press. Inspired by her own family’s history, the story follows the Barbera family from Sicily to the Colorado mines and Brooklyn, highlighting the strong women and men who navigated, and reportedly inspired, the early Mafia. We asked Linda a few questions to learn more about the book.
“The Descendant” is inspired by your own family’s history. What first sparked your decision to turn that legacy into a novel?
Two things inspired me to turn my family’s story, which is based on the real events, into a novel. First was the idea that I needed to change the horrible accepted stereotype of Italians, and particularly Sicilian immigrants. I call it acceptable unconscious bigotry. It seems that it’s always OK to stereotype Italians as thugs, and it’s fine to believe that all of our ancestors landed in New York City and became criminals. Wrong. Thousands upon thousands of Italians helped settle the West, endured bondage in the coal mines, and escaped via bootlegging when Colorado declared prohibition four years before the rest of the country. They were hunted down by the KKK, striking coal miners and their wives, children were burnt to death by murderers hired by John D. Rockefeller Jr. Nonethess, those who escaped became cattle ranchers, had large goat herds and vast vegetable farms.
The second, and perhaps real reason I was compelled to write this book was because of the strong magical bond of the Barbera sisters and their mother, Maria. They defied all the odds to become cowgirls, bosses, and brides who married out of their race, gender, and the boundaries imposed upon them. I was always so impressed by them, and angered when as a kid people would say to me, “What do you mean your mother rode her horse to school? Aren’t you Eye-Talian?” I wanted to write the history that the rich and powerful managed to wash away. No, the West was not settled by men who spoke like John Wayne.
The novel traces the journey from Sicily to the Colorado mines and Brooklyn. What was the most fascinating part of researching that experience?
I had only heard in snippets about the Ludlow Massacre in which J.D. Rockefeller paid National Guardsmen and detectives poured oil on top of the striking miners’ tents, set them ablaze, and burned alive dozens of women, children, and striking miners. It was the worst event in American labor history, and because the victims were Italian and many other ethnic minorities, the whole ugly event was suppressed and never written into our history books. I want “The Descendant” to change all that.
I was shocked to find that 90 percent of the young men in my grandparents’ Sicilian village of Lucca Secula were recruited away to Pueblo, Colorado, only to find themselves indentured and in bondage with no way out. They were paid in company scrip, didn’t speak the language, were illiterate for the most part, and were routinely murdered by the KKK, who were deputized as prohibition agents when alcohol became forbidden by law in Colorado.
After years as a journalist, how did writing a historical novel challenge you differently?
Because writing a novel is the total opposite of being a journalist, it took me a very long time to learn the craft. It’s like teaching a singer to act or a dancer to sing. I now even teach novel writing to journalists at the Newswomen’s Club of NY. In journalism, you do two things: You write lean, and you make sure of your facts. When you write a novel, you write fat (describing everything and everywhere), and you can make stuff up. After I finished my first novel, “The Sixth Station,” I called my mentor and friend, the late greatest Nelson DeMille, and said, “Oh my God. I think I made a mistake about where a certain cheese is made!” He laughed really hard and said, “Oh, for God’s sake. It’s fiction! Say whatever the hell you want.”
What do you hope readers take away from “The Descendant”?
My fondest wish, hope, desire is that readers come away from reading “The Descendant” with an understanding of our wiped-out American history and perhaps understand that the more things change, the more they don’t — especially when it comes to immigrants and immigration. Our immigrant ancestors are a horrific mirror to how immigrants are looked upon and treated nowadays.