this book was boring and unreal. The adventure these two went on was to fake and at times bored the reader. some of the descriptions could of been longer. ( )

I found this book to be dark and somewhat disturbing. It was difficult for me to read. Casual sex, casual drugs, casual violence are all a part of this story, and maybe I just wasn't in the mood, but I didn't like it. It was just a bit too sad somehow for me.

review from Italian Americana, (academic journal)Spring 2009The Fiddle Case by Christine Palamidessi Moore. Boston:/IAP Press, 2008. 243pp.

In this coming-of-age story two nineteen-year-old women set out across the country in the summer of 1972, searching for answers about siblings they have lost. Their initial goal is soon overshadowed by the trip itself, reminiscent of Thelma and Louise. What begins as an upbeat adventure evolves into a dark thriller as they try to return a stolen fiddle to a cult member. The plot has many twists and turns, taking us across landscapes from Boston to Berkeley. The language conjures up images that titillate the senses: “sex was like a swirling tornado of white light.” Music of the time pervades; it is the driving force behind the road trip. References to politics (Watergate, Vietnam), to music (Beatles, B.B. King), to something as mundane as cigarette brands (low-tar Salems in Kentucky, Virginia Slims in California) convey larger meanings of the cultural background. The alliance between Anna and Cindy is central; other characters serve to illuminate their personalities or carry the plot forward.

Palamidessi Moore paints a convincing picture of the contradictions that women faced with the new sexual freedom of the 1970s. Although both claim to be liberated, Anna and Cindy argue over whether they are responsible for each other or should just allow each one to do whatever she wants at the moment. Anna has sex for the first time and Cindy complains about Bill who is twenty-eight while she is only nineteen. He asked what she wanted him to do in lovemaking. She was upset: shouldn’t he teach her something she didn’t already know? Aren’t men supposed to be the aggressors? Such paradoxes expose the dilemmas of the generation.

As with her first novel, The Virgin Knows, Moore weaves fantasy into the tale. The fiddle case exudes a flood of light and warmth when least expected, punctuating a closeness of spirit like that of trust or intimacy between friends. The relationship between siblings in both novels carries the resentment that one feels about the good fortune of the other. Considering the view that a novel should be like a street full of strangers where no more than two or three people are known to us in depth, Fiddle hits the mark.

There is little to identify the italianità of the novelist in contrast to The Virgin Knows, which moves from Rome to the United States and associates the characters with Italian culture on both sides of the Atlantic. But in The Fiddle Case Palamidessi Moore has left ethnicity behind to concentrate on details of American culture in the 1970s with its cults, folk music, and sexual liberation couched in an engaging, suspenseful story.

MARIE SACCOMANDO COPPOLA, PhD ( )

Summer 1972, Anna and Cindy, 19 year old best friends hitch-hike their way from a folk festival in Kentucky to California in search of Anna's sister Daria (who always seems to be one step ahead of them) and her boyfriend, a folk music star Charlie Cyr, both of whom are members of a cult "The Group". With them they bring Charlie's violin which they have managed to rescue after it was stolen.

I was expecting something quite different of this book - a bit of a glimpse at the atmosphere of the folk scene in the 70s maybe. I certainly expected it to be more evocative - but then, I wasn't born in 1972, so I am really no judge of this and I probably should have read the blurb properly - it would be better described as a "coming of age" story. The plot is fairly disjointed, leaping around between situations that stretched my imagination at least. The characters themselves seem to be more caricature than realistic (in particular the leader of "The Group", who just seems completely insane). This said, I did find the mercurial relationship between the two girls reasonably convincing, down to them being able to pick up from where they left off, years later (in the prologue) - although I would have expected such great mates to have stayed in touch with each other.

All in all, this wasn't really my thing, but it was a fairly quick read and, at the end of the day, I did want to know how it would finish. ( )

This book is a young adult novel. A coming of age adventure quest story. It is about two 19 year old girls trying to return a fiddle to whom they believe is the owner. Along their hitchhiking route from Kentuky to California, they encounter characters that I didn't learn very much about , despite their detailed descriptions. Most were manipulative members of 'The Group'. An anti-corporate corporation who preaches hippie ideals to wandering souls taking advantage of people wanting to belong with violence and lies.

The ideas in this book are interesting- unfortunately it was not fully developed. The story leaps along on scattered incidents. I did not like either one of the main characters, they were shallow and selfish. I did not care if they managed to escape their poorly thought out decisions. The only thing that did peak my interest was the mysterious history of the fiddle which was never thoroughly explained. ( )