Zibby Owens (2:27)

Hi, this is Zibby Owens and you're listening to Totally Booked with Zibby. Formerly Moms don't have time to read Books. In my daily show, I interview today's latest best selling buzziest or underrated authors and story creators whose work I think is worth your time. As a bookstore owner, publisher, author, and obviously podcaster, I get a comprehensive look at everything that's coming out and spend my time curating the best books so you don't have to stay in the know, get insider insights and connect with guests like I do every single day. For more information, go to zibbymedia.com and follow me on Instagram IBBEowens.

Podcast Host (Siby) (3:11)

Today is.

Zibby Owens (3:12)

Number nine on the list of the number 10 most downloaded Totally Booked episodes of 2020.

Podcast Host (Siby) (3:20)

Go back to yesterday to hear number 10 and now we're up to number nine and we'll be doing this for the next two weeks. Enjoy.

Zibby Owens (3:26)

Adriana Ciggiani is back on the podcast to talk about the View from Lake Como, a novel. Adriana Triggiani is the New York Times bestselling author of 21 books of fiction and nonfiction. Her work has been published in 38 languages around the world. An award winning playwright, television writer, producer and filmmaker, Georgiani wrote and directed the major motion picture of her debut novel, Big Stone Gap, adapted her novel Very Valentine for television and directed the documentary Queens of the Big Time, among others. In 2023, President Sergio Mattarella of Italy awarded Triggiani the Cavaliere dell' Ordine della Stella d'.

Podcast Host (Siby) (4:04)

Italia.

Zibby Owens (4:05)

The Library of Virginia bestowed their highest honor, the Patron of Letters degree, to Triggiani. In 2024, she received the 2025 Ellis Island Medal of Honor for her significant contributions to literature, culture and community. Trijiani grew up in Appalachia in the mountains of Virginia, where she co founded the Origin Project, a year round in school writing program that has served over 25,000 students since its inception in 2014. Trijiani is proud to serve on the New York State Council on the Arts. She lives in Greenwich Village with her family.

Podcast Host (Siby) (4:35)

Welcome back, Adriana. So excited to have you on totally booked with Civvie to talk about the view from Lake Como. Congrats.

Adriana Triggiani (4:43)

Thank you so much. I am thrilled and honored to be here. You know I adore you.

Podcast Host (Siby) (4:47)

Oh, I adore you too.

Adriana Triggiani (4:48)

Thank you.

Podcast Host (Siby) (4:49)

Okay. At first I thought, oh great, I'm going to Lake Como. And then I was like, what? Lake Como, New Jersey?

Grow Therapy Announcer (4:54)

What the heck.

Podcast Host (Siby) (4:56)

Okay, so your book starts in New Jersey.

Adriana Triggiani (4:59)

You get both. I know. Listen, we can't get mislead our our listeners. You get both. But you know, you know at different stages of your life you do different things and people were getting married in New Jersey for I had cousins getting married down there and different. And we found ourselves in New Jersey a lot. And I just started nosing around and I found this town, Lake Como, and I thought this was hilarious. This is like. Is your sister city Lake Como, Italy? Like, because my mother's people are Lombardian and so we're from that area. So I started nosing around and found out that the town changed its name. It used to be South Belmont. This made this made it more hilarious to me because the property values were plummeting and they wanted to resuscitate this town. So they took a vote and they renamed it Lake Como.

Podcast Host (Siby) (5:47)

And the rest is history.

Adriana Triggiani (5:48)

And the rest is history. And I just, you know, when I go to write a book, it happens on many layers. And this character, Jess Barrata, just got divorced and she's really living in her parents basement. Sad. And she has to rebuild. And I thought how interesting that she living in a town that had to rebuild.

Podcast Host (Siby) (6:09)

Totally. I love that. Okay, tell listeners what the book is about.

Adriana Triggiani (6:13)

Well, you know, I kind of. Here's my elevator pitch. It's the story of a woman who rebuilds her life and the house that goes with it. And this is a lot of things on my mind that fed into this for the three year process of writing it that I contemplated. And one of them is like, where do I feel at most at peace in the world? And the truth is I feel at peace in my grandmother and mother's hometown on the mountain in Italy. I just do in the snow. Like, I like snow. I'm one of those people. And when I say a piece, I mean in communion with the ever after. So that, that I wanted to write about that. And then. And so many times too, Zibby, we. We make mistakes that we think are mistakes and they bring us shame and guilt and whatever, but that's not really what they are. They're just like doorways to another life. And so I wanted to dramatize that in a book. And so it's true of every layer of the book. Yeah.

Podcast Host (Siby) (7:14)

Well, even though the book is about Jess, it's also about Uncle Louie and what happens with his life and some of his decisions. And as he, you know, this is fairly on. I feel like I'm not giving too much away. I don't know. But you know, when he passes away very sort of dramatically and she finds out all of this stuff about her uncle who's basically like her dad, I mean, they're so close and he's been such a role model to her, and then she has to uncover all these sort of family secrets that lay dormant. And yet you put it all under the context of, like, the marble industry, which who knows anything about, which is so fascinating. Talk about that relationship, the uncle niece relationship, which, by the way, does not get a lot of airtime in fiction.

Adriana Triggiani (8:01)

No. Well, you have the are. And eventually I dedicated it to my four uncles that have passed away, that each one were very different people, but I got something from each of them. And when I dived into the relationship between Uncle Louie and Jess, you find that there's a level of honesty there that you can't have with anybody else. And she is in the family business with him, so they're the last two men standing. Her mother's complicated. Her Uncle Louis tried to give his sister a job. She just was terrible with the public, but he can't tell her that. And they go on and off from not speaking. I don't know if in your family do people not speak or is that an Italian thing? Do they go to the island? We send them to the island. That's when we're not talking to them. Called the island.

Podcast Host (Siby) (8:49)

And we all speak. It's what's not said. I think that's interesting.

Adriana Triggiani (8:52)

Okay, that's fascinating. Okay, well, this is true, too. Well, what's not said and then not. And then holding a grudge when. Maybe if we spoke, we could work it out. But this is how they deal with things. And they never, when they start resume speaking, would they solve the problem. So it was repeated. And there's this idea that this kind of behavior reverberates in life. So she's going to have to make a break with that somehow, even though Uncle Louie isn't here to work it out with, he's present through the whole book, but he isn't present physically through the whole book. So as she's working it out and she makes a determination that she needs help. She can't do this on her own. So she's the first person since the Etruscans in this family that went to see a therapist. But she doesn't go to see him in an office, she goes online. And of course her mother says, go to the priest. It's free.

Podcast Host (Siby) (9:51)

What's it called? Like, true tech or something? I don't know.

Zibby Owens (9:53)

New step. New step.

Adriana Triggiani (9:54)

Theramy.

Podcast Host (Siby) (9:55)

Theramy. Oh, my gosh. Okay, I know what new step is. Yes. Which is also fascinating. We can all use a little help, I'm sure.

Adriana Triggiani (10:02)

Why not? You write your problem down in the morning and you call somebody, hey, what do I do about this. Got any ideas?

Podcast Host (Siby) (10:08)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Perfect. I found myself kind of wanting Jess to get back together with her ex. I don't know why. And I was like, why did she do that? And you say at the start that, like, the whole town wanted them to reconcile, right? Like a huge movement. And, you know, as someone who's divorced, I'm like, oh, no, no, no, they should not reconcile. There's a reason. Da, da, da. But then as it kept going on, I was like, but wait, I don't know. Where's this going?

Adriana Triggiani (10:35)

Well, you know, there's a. There's a moment in the book when they realize what they mean to each other. And sometimes, you know, Sibi, we don't. We don't know. To me, just between us two girls here, I think it's a mystery what makes a marriage work. I mean, you could say communication and this and that, but it's just sort of something you sort of know. It's the same feeling you get when you know you need to get out of a relationship that you. You can't stay in it another minute. If you do, you'll just shrivel up and die. I mean, so those two energy fields fed this novel too, because I wanted her to reconcile that, that she could love or appreciate or not her ex husband and maybe get back together with him if they were at a different place. But as the novel unspools, you find out what happened and it's the way she reacted and he reacted to this trauma. And it was never going to work, right? Or maybe it would, but she'd have to be the master of her destiny. So for the listener, you're going to get a very beefy choice here between two people for her. And I kept saying to the publishers, my beautiful publishers at Penguin Random House, at Dutton, kept saying to those folks, hey, this is a self love story. This is about somebody who has to. She's not going to navigate this through a relationship. She's going to navigate it through her life experience.

Podcast Host (Siby) (12:09)

Very interesting. Plus, you throw in not only the travel through self and identity, but literal travel where you take us, you do take us out of New Jersey. Thank you very much. I mean, not that there's anything wrong with New Jersey, but, you know, everybody likes a little travel. Grab the passport. So you do offer us that sort of escape. And through Jess's eyes. And what can we learn from other cultures? And where is our happy place in life?

Adriana Triggiani (12:33)

There's an Italian sculptor, a young sculptor named Jago J A G Go some Say Iago. Some say Jago.

Podcast Host (Siby) (12:42)

Let's say Iago.

Adriana Triggiani (12:43)

Let's say Iago. He's Italian and they call him the modern Michelangelo. And I was invited, or Michelangelo and I was invited to a screening of the film about his life and his creations. And he has created or did a new. The idea of marble when it. It seems sheer, like fabric, you know, like Michelangelo did. But here's the thing, Zibby. All that marble came from one source on one mountain. And it shall until the end of time. They will never use up the marble on that mountain. It is sheared off. It is not blasted anymore. It hasn't been blasted since the 70s. It's cut. These men. I explain all of that because I am fascinated by the craftsmanship of this. The idea of marble is that it's very durable. Obviously that David is still standing. It's very durable. But if you just tap it in the wrong way, turns to dust and she observes this. Jess Barrata observes this. That. That's her. Her heart, really herself, her soul. Like, it's like a woman. You tap it just in the wrong way. Goodbye. We are finished, right? And I loved how that. She's a draftsman, we should say that. Which I got into that. If you go to New Jersey, there's a lot of Italian marble there, because that's the port where it comes in. So there's a lot of marble, Carrara marble, we should say Carrara, Italy and Tuscany. So it's all part of the whole waft and weave of who she is. It's like her. Her life with her family, her parents, her brother, her sister, her ch. You know, the idea that maybe someday she'll have children, their children. She's the maiden aunt. Even though she's been married, she is the sister who is going to end up being the caretaker. In our Italian heritage, there's always one that stays home and does that or becomes a nun or a flight attendant in one of those careers. And if that's the case, you know, then we have a story about somebody who has to say, oh, that's the role you put me in. But that's not the role I necessarily want to live. And so that's really what it's about. Because a lot of us are walking through life, there's a line out the door. People want to tell us how to do what we do, but that's not the way to do it. The way to do it is it for it to be self motivated? What fills you up? What makes you complete? Who is your life partner where it's not dictated by a culture. Just because he's the cutest guy in town and he's the most prosperous doesn't mean you have to marry him.

Podcast Host (Siby) (15:24)

Let that echo throughout the townspeople.

Adriana Triggiani (15:28)

That's right. That town. Yeah, exactly right. Exactly right. Ready to order?

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Podcast Host (Siby) (18:16)

So have you had an experience where your heart turned to dust?

Adriana Triggiani (18:21)

Well, that's an interesting question. Zip. I am someone, I'm going to be really honest. Where I love what I do so much. That was always my focus. So, you know, crush is this or that. And I really married the man I fell in love with. I did not fall in love with anybody else. Now is that weird? People are going to write in because. But. And I'm going to take it a step further. I don't really like the feeling of falling in love. There are people who are addicted to it. It made me sick. It's dizzying to me. Evidently something chemically happens in your brain and like. And while I love him and I'm still with him and we're married and all of that. I know you experienced this with Kyle, but it's like, it's a thing. It's like that. You know that I don't question it, right when you start to question it. Well, you know what I say? Check the exits. Check the exits. Get the hell out of Dodge.

Podcast Host (Siby) (19:17)

Okay, wait. That's so interesting. The idea that one could be essentially allergic to falling in love. Isn't that a story in itself? You have to keep running away from love.

Adriana Triggiani (19:29)

Yeah. It's not that it wasn't pleasurable, but I found it very odd. I found it. And then, and then I had friends tell me they loved that feeling of that roller coaster for the first, you know, six weeks or whatever. And I'm like, for me, maybe I just don't like heights, I don't know. But it's just I like the abiding part of love, of the mistake making part and the not being my best every day and then trying to do better. And you really know if you love someone when they get sick, if they drive you crazy, better check the exits. I mean, but if you find yourself naturally, everything falls away. And I am caring for this person. I think that's a pretty good. Do you agree? I think that's a good indicator.

Podcast Host (Siby) (20:21)

I mean, do we have to extend this to dental work?

Adriana Triggiani (20:24)

No.

Podcast Host (Siby) (20:25)

Okay then yes, I agree.

Adriana Triggiani (20:26)

That's the worst. That's the worst pain on the planet. Yeah, that's funny. No, I think that's what I like to wrestle with when I'm writing novels. I don't get to live everything, but I certainly can imagine everything. And if I can imagine it, then I can write it. And if I can write it, then I can make something manifest for the audience, for the reader, for the woman reading the book.

Podcast Host (Siby) (20:51)

So when you kept going back and writing more and more into this book on a day where maybe you didn't feel like writing so much, what was it that kept calling you to it?

Adriana Triggiani (21:01)

Well, you know, when you're in one of those places where it seems sort of hard, look down the road of your plot a little bit and what you're going to. This is just true of me for the writers listening, but I pull the scene that's waiting for me forward, and I actually did it when. When we were editing the big Stone Gap movie, the editor was. Had reached a. He was bollocks up. And I went, take that scene there, put it here. And once we did that, then we had a path. So a lot of times, it's not about staying stuck and trying to push through the stuck, but pull something forward that you know you're going to do. Because a lot of times what writers do is they know they have this big scene coming, so there's a build to it. Just do the big scene, see what happens. Then you can. Then you can move it around and play with it.

Podcast Host (Siby) (21:48)

Excellent advice.

Adriana Triggiani (21:49)

Yeah. For me, in the book, there's. There's two. There's two, like. We call them comedy block scenes in television and film, but it's. They're. They're the family. Everybody's there. And so you have a myriad of voices, which. I love those scenes, like where there's a party and somebody shouts something. I love them. And there your clues are in that scene, because from the big scene, you'll see where you paired off people, and then that can create the entree into the scene.

Podcast Host (Siby) (22:21)

So just basically write a party, write.

Adriana Triggiani (22:23)

A party, write a meal, write people creating something together, something that they're doing that is a common purpose, and you'll find it in there.

Podcast Host (Siby) (22:33)

Like marble, perhaps.

Adriana Triggiani (22:36)

Just like marble. Getting that marble. Did you just love that scene when the marble's coming up? I wouldn't watch that happen. I love that marble coming off that tankard.

Podcast Host (Siby) (22:43)

I was literally thinking through this whole. I was like, oh, my gosh, how much research did she have to do? Like, how did. Did she know any of this before? Did you. I mean, this is a lot of detail.

Adriana Triggiani (22:53)

Well, I knew A little bit. A little bit. Just from my travels to Italy, I knew a little bit. But then I wanted to understand how they sell it, get it off the map. This is also what's interesting to me. Like, how do they do that? Because I had my great grandfather Davida, which is David in Italian. Davida Perrine of Venice. Venetian. He was from the Veneto. He only had three fingers on one hand. And he took a job. He was a farmer. He ended up to be quite prosperous. Zibi. He, like, did a whole thing on the. Where he bought this piece of land in Pennsylvania. Just kept adding to it. He was very American, entrepreneurial, even though he was Italian. Venetian. Anyway, there's a whole story to how he lost those fingers in a quarry, Slate quarry in Pennsylvania. Because the most. The worst job in a quarry is the blaster, is the guy who handles the dynamite. And one of it was not stacked properly, and it blew his fingers off. Well, I didn't mean to, like, ruin our day, but learned to manage with the three. He was great, but that. I always wanted to understand how that happened. And so when I went to Carrara, now they shear it, okay? They block it. She. It's almost like they put points in it and they take it off, like in blocks. In the old days, they blew it up, and then what came down that wasn't shattered, they used and they realized they were wasting. So that. See, that's the stuff I get into. It's like. And going up the mountain and, well, what. Where were the offices? I went in a trailer and that conjured all those scenes and the historian who's along for the ride and what all that meant and how she. She didn't know where her career was going to go. She didn't know where it was going to go. She knew. She knew how to do what she did, which was draft. But maybe there's something else for her.

Podcast Host (Siby) (24:52)

I feel like that analogy also applies to writing. Like, at first, you just keep blowing things up, and then as you get better, you can. Like a little bit.

Adriana Triggiani (25:02)

You can see what's under you under better. But that takes time. That really takes time. You're making a great point about writing because you can know something for sure, you think. And then you get it down and you go, oh, that's not where this is supposed to go. And you work it out. You figure it out.

Podcast Host (Siby) (25:24)

So you spend your time writing, but you also are uplifting authors, talking to people, podcasts. You do so many different things.

Adriana Triggiani (25:31)

Well, you're my sister in crime. With this.

Podcast Host (Siby) (25:34)

I'm just saying.

Adriana Triggiani (25:36)

Which I love, because you're a writer, You're a novelist, and you do this. Okay, look, I started doing this six years ago. I was terrible. And like, we. We. We get better as we do it, but I'm just deeply curious, and I would have these conversations anyway, so I just started to think. A book comes in, and I. And I get really interested. Like a. Like tomorrow, I'm talking to David Litt about. About surfing. I wouldn't any more surf than the man in the movie. It's riveting. Today, Susan Morrison, who wrote the biography of Lorne Michaels you've had these folks on. So you know them, and their books are revelatory. And if I can help sell them for them, whatever I can do, I want to do that because put it in the hands of librarians, put it in the hands of readers. Put it in the hands of people who want to discuss things. You know, my mom was a librarian, and she said there's an answer for every problem in the world in the library, any problem we have, you know, personal, spiritual, emotional, practical. There's a manual or there's a book or there's a point of view. So I love. I love doing it. So it's a lot of work that. Zibby. We. We always call you Saint Zibby behind your back because we don't know how you do it. I. I like. I'm always. When I'm on an airplane, I've got three books with me. I gotta finish or I gotta. You know. And you can sit however you want, which is the beauty of this. But it's a huge service to the reader, to the listener right now. It really is. And I thank you for it. I think it's great.

Podcast Host (Siby) (27:11)

Well, I thank you, too. And I think, like you, I am also curious. And so, yes, of course, we're doing this for authors, but also for ourselves, because it's so fascinating.

Adriana Triggiani (27:20)

Your brain gets. Don't you feel you're a better writer because you read at the volume you read at? That's the shocker to me, because when I was writing my novels and we were raising family, I. I didn't read a lot of fiction. I was writing it, so I didn't have time to read it. I enjoy it, you know. Yeah. Now I really enjoy your work. I enjoy it, which I didn't have the chance to do before, you know.

Podcast Host (Siby) (27:48)

Well, I did really love this book of yours, I have to say. It was really good.

Adriana Triggiani (27:52)

I loved that you loved it. And I love you and I thank you so much because little trip to Italy. Not that. Could. Couldn't we? Always a trip to Italy. Always, always.

Podcast Host (Siby) (28:01)

When you lead a retreat there. Sign me up. I'm gonna come.

Adriana Triggiani (28:04)

Okay, baby.

Grow Therapy Announcer (28:05)

Okay.

Adriana Triggiani (28:05)

You got it. You got it, you got it.

Podcast Host (Siby) (28:07)

Congratulations.

Adriana Triggiani (28:08)

Thank you. Thank you.

Podcast Host (Siby) (28:09)

I'm so excited for you guys.

Adriana Triggiani (28:10)

Okay, thank you.

Zibby Owens (28:11)

Thank you. Bye.

Adriana Triggiani (28:12)

Take care, sweetie. I'll see you soon.

Podcast Host (Siby) (28:13)

You too. Okay.

Zibby Owens (28:15)

Thank you for listening to Totally booked with Siby, formerly Moms don't have time to read books. If you loved the show, tell a friend, leave a review, follow me on Instagram ippyowens and spread the word. Thanks so much. Oh, and buy the books.

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Two turtledoves plus a partridge in a pear tree? Sure.

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