cover image ANTONIO'S WIFE

ANTONIO'S WIFE

Jacqueline DeJohn, . . Regan Books, $24.95 (434pp) ISBN 978-0-06-055800-0

The glamorous world of opera in the early 20th century provides the backdrop for this melodramatic debut. Francesca Frascatti arrives in New York in 1908 to sing Tosca at the Manhattan Opera House (costumed so that her breasts "thrust forward like twin crème caramels"). The diva—famous for both her tantrums and artistry—is accompanied by the dashing Dante Romano, whom everyone imagines is her lover, but who is, in fact, a detective hired to help Cesca find her long-lost daughter. The lovely, naïve Mina DiGianni, a seamstress living on the Lower East Side with her abusive husband, Antonio, is promoted from the opera's costume shop to be Cesca's personal dresser. DeJohn leaks the "secret" early on, hinting heavily that Mina—who came to New York as a mail-order bride—is really Francesca's daughter. But what is Mina hiding from her own past? The web of intrigue spins tighter as affluent and sordid New York worlds converge: Cesca and Dante must determine Mina's true identity before Cesca's Mafia father-in-law can spirit Mina back to Italy; Mina and Dante begin to fall in love; and they all contend with the sinister counterplottings of Antonio and his mistress, Kathleen—an Irish saloon owner so cartoonishly slutty and fiendish that she raises the she-devil to new heights of cliché. Had the patently good and obviously evil guys simply been allowed to duke it out, this narrative might have cleverly spoofed its operatic concept; the underlying theme of "destino" (destiny), however, ruins the fun a bit with its overly serious tone. For fans who like their characters more vaudevillian than operatic, however, this is one roiling historical costume fest and a speedy, digestible read. (Mar.)