Rebecca Serle <[email protected]> Tue, Jun 29, 2021, 5:24 PM
To: Hotel Poseidon <[email protected] via> Subject: RE: Your Beautiful Hotel Hi Liliana, I wanted to say that we just announced my new book. It will be out next March and takes place in large part at your stunning hotel. Thank you for making the trip so memorable I simply had to write about it. More soon. It’s called One Italian Summer, btw
I cannot wait to return. Summer 2022 is coming! We will get there.
Love,
Rebecca
Acknowledgments
First:
To Melissa, Jennifer, and Leah Seligmann—and Sue who made them. Thank you for letting me in this close.
To Jessica Rothenberg, for sharing with me all the boundless love and impossible grief that comes with having her for a soul mate. I told you once I would never forget—now it’s in writing.
And to Estefania Marchan, who over a decade ago said she missed her mother at eighteen, and twenty-six, and five—all the ages and women she had never known.
This is for you, and for them.
Now:
To my agent, Erin Malone, for being everything I’m not: meticulous, flexible, professional. I am prone to hyperbole, but you’re #1, it’s just the truth. I could not possibly ask for a better or more fruitful partnership. You are never getting rid of me.
To my editor, Lindsay Sagnette, for being the greatest champion and cheerleader. Thank you for your trust in me, and for opening your doors so wide and offering me absolutely everything inside.
To my publisher, Libby McGuire, who has made Atria my dream home. Thank you, thank you.
To my publicist, Ariele Fredman, who is part wizard and part witch. I don’t know how you do what you do, but I sure am lucky you do it for me.
To Isabel DaSilva—I’m sorry I suck at the Internet. I’m trying （I should try harder）。 Thank you for making my books soar.
To Jon Karp and the late and brilliant Carolyn Reidy for helping In Five Years achieve so many career highs. I’ll be grateful forever.
To my manager, David Stone, for the long history and the new beginning.
To my agents Chelsea Radler and Hilary Michael for thinking （almost） everything I write is worth people reading and watching.
To Sabrina Taitz for being the best substitute teacher in the biz. We’ll always have Maui.
To the entire sales team at Simon & Schuster: you do the impossible for me.
To Camille Morgan, Fiora Elbers-Tibbitts, Erica Nori, Gwen Beal, and Anna Ravenelle for holding all the details together.
To Caitlin Mahony and Matilda Forbes Watson for making sure Dannie and Bella and Katy and Carol and Sabrina and Tobias are well looked after abroad.
To Lexa Hillyer for being the most wonderful friend and the most wonderful mother. Our mornings are my favorite time of day. And to Minna, my angel girl.
To Leila Sales for thinking I’m nuts, but voting for me anyway.
To Hannah Brown Gordon for forgiving me countless indiscretions, and for making it ever easier to fill an ever-expanding list.
To Danielle Kasirer for being my pod, my family, for making my coffee with just the right amount of creamer and for always having the peanut M&M’S.
To Niki Koss for being my big/little and the black T-shirt to my Ross.
To Jodi Guber Brufsky, whose home and heart is my happy place.
To Raquel Johnson for the love and the years and the glue, baby.
To Morgan Matson and Jen Smith for walking the path so close by.
To Laurel Sakai—because I would never be here without you, and it’s time I said it in print.
To my dad, who is a wonderful man and a wonderful husband and a wonderful father. And who takes great pride and joy in my mother’s and my union, however many bagels or however much pasta it might not allow him to consume.
To the wonderful people at the Hotel Poseidon Positano, most especially Liliana.
And finally to you, this time around: one of life’s most important challenges is determining what to hold on to and what to let go of. Do not be fooled into believing that you do not know which is which. Follow the feeling, follow it all the way home.
One Italian Summer
Rebecca Serle
This reading group guide for One Italian Summer includes an introduction, discussion questions, ideas for enhancing your book club, and a Q&A with author Rebecca Serle. The suggested questions are intended to help your reading group find new and interesting angles and topics for your discussion. We hope that these ideas will enrich your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book.
Introduction
When Katy’s mother dies, she is left reeling. Carol wasn’t just Katy’s mom but her best friend and first phone call. Even Katy’s husband can’t seem to get through to her—she is lost without her anchor. Her mother was her true north.