The Deep Blue Sea for Beginners by Luanne Rice

Author:Luanne Rice
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Romance, Psychological fiction, Contemporary Women, Capri Island (Italy), Family Life, Fiction, Fiction - General, Sagas, Psychological, Mothers and daughters, American Contemporary Fiction - Individual Authors +, Large type books, Fiction - Romance, General, Domestic fiction, Romance - General
ISBN: 9780553805147
Publisher: Random House, Inc.
Published: 2009-08-04T10:18:26.580000+00:00

Da Vincenzo was located in Capri town, off the main square. They drove down the crooked streets in Max’s ancient Hillman. Lyra felt the summer breeze blow through the open windows and thought of how often she, Max, and Christina had driven in this old car to this, their favorite restaurant.

The kids talked in the back seat. Lyra glanced down at Max’s hand on the gearshift. He’d once told her he’d had the car sent from England. It was sea green, small and compact, barely large enough for four. The salt air rusted it unmercifully, but Max cared for it and Nicolas kept it running. Lyra felt a rush of tenderness for the way Max loved things.

“What is it?” he asked, catching her looking at him.

“Nothing,” she said. “I’m glad we’re all together tonight.”

“So am I,” he said, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a deep smile.

They parked on a side street, fitting into an impossibly small spot. The rustic old house stood at the end of a dark and narrow alley, in a hidden park filled with lemon trees. Voices carried from the town square; doves roosted under the eaves of tall, crooked buildings.

Max held the door open. They all walked into the restaurant. Da Vincenzo was half used-book store, half trattoria, making it necessary to pass through stacks of books, over readers sitting on the floor, under a staircase leading to the second floor, where the poetry and drama sections could be found, as well as several cramped guest rooms where, legend had it, many now-famous young writers had once stayed.

All the way in back, through a heavy burgundy velvet curtain, the trattoria was cozy and intimate, illuminated by scores of red candles. The menu featured local seafood, homemade pasta, and pizzas cooked in a wood-fired oven.

The dining room walls were lined with bookshelves, overflowing with old volumes that lone diners were invited to read while eating. Yellowed prints of great Italian writers hung below brass sconces, tarnished from the sea air; Lyra glanced up and saw Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio.

The place was favored by young intellectuals, and had been ever since Lyra had first come to Capri. She examined the menu and tried to picture Max here as a young man. She couldn’t help turn her head, look at him again, as she had in the car. His leonine head was bent as he studied the menu, half-spectacles perched on the end of his sharp nose. Craggy and powerful, he was still a handsome man.

“This is charming and wonderful,” Pell said, looking up from her menu. “I love it, Max.”

“I thought you might,” Max said. “There are fancier establishments in Capri, but none with quite so much warmth. And the food is superb.”

“Grandpa’s been coming here since he was our age,” Rafe said, as if he’d heard the story a million times.

“Not quite, but close,” Max said. “The original owner, Vincenzo Pertosa, was a friend to young writers and artists—not unlike Sylvia Beach at Shakespeare and Company in Paris.

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