Angry spaghetti, music, secrets, courage and, of course, chillies…
I’m so grateful to all of you who’ve shown such love for, The Proxy Bride, thank you, grazie di cuore. ❤️
It was an honour to write about these resilient, spirited women.
Buona giornata a tutti! 😊🌶️🍝
Tag Archives: The Proxy Bride
Felce Azzurra and scented memories…
When writing, The Proxy Bride, I bought, for the first time, a bottle of Felce Azzurra (blue fern) talcum powder – last seen decades ago in the bathroom cabinet at Nonno Anni and Nanna Francesca’s (beside the Oil of Ulan and Pino Sivestre). The latter two brands have been around since the 1950s, while Felce Azzurra has been made in Alessandria, Italy since 1876!
It’s amazing how powerful scent can be in evoking a memory. That first intake of musky, fern freshness rocketed me straight back to being young, staying at my grandparents’ house. How Nanna Francesca emerged from the bathroom after her morning shower in a cloud of this scent, dressed ready to take me to ‘the pictures’. I couldn’t resist including it in Proxy.
While the book is fiction, I loved combining true goings-on with the story I created, adding in twists and turns. To me it’s crucial to make something as authentic as possible and the collage pictured is just a fraction of many elements that inspired me and that I wove in with material from interviews, libraries, museums and research trips (Palmi, Calabria and Stanthorpe, Qld being vital!) I wonder how many of these pictures you may recognise from the story?!
I was especially thrilled to find a photograph of proxy brides on a ship to Australia to be with husbands they’d mostly never met. Each face, each stance even, tells a different story in that moment. It’s such a poignant scene knowing their lives are about to change forever. It would’ve been so tough in many ways and I admire them greatly. I hope they found some happiness. Zoë xx
(PS. And yes, I had a Walkman just like that as a teenager and Nanna Francesca had a 1950s stereogram and loved playing her Italian record collection, including a bit of Dean Martin!)
The Proxy Bride…
Filed under inspiration + history
The Proxy Bride book out today…
Today’s the day! The Proxy Bride has arrived and is in book shops! Kind of incredible to be holding it in my hands. For many decades the term, ‘proxy bride’ has been whispered, rarely spoken of, let alone written about – a long-hidden part of our history. It’s unlikely we’ll see Italian-Australian proxy marriages again and I wanted to write about them because these women especially were remarkably brave and their stories deserve more than a whisper.
It was actually Nonno Anni who set me to writing this book. When I was talking to him about his life for, Joe’s Fruit Shop and Milk Bar, by chance he mentioned that during WW2 in Australia when he and other Italians got sent to internment camps, the wives and children suddenly left alone on the farms did it very tough and almost starved. But a group of them banded together, he told me, and kept their farms going. That struck and I knew I’d return one day to write about it.
When I learned some of these women were proxy brides, it opened up even more to the story. Of course, this is just one part of, The Proxy Bride. There’s much more including some laughs, cooking, music inspired by Nanna Francesca’s 1950s stereogram, secrets and quite a few Italian brands and traditions you may recognise! I hope you enjoy reading it.❤️🍝🎶 Zoë x
Available today in paperback and ebook in book shops, department stores and online. (Will let you know when there is audio book news.) Thanks to all those at HQ Fiction and HarperCollins who helped bring this about and to you for your lovely ongoing support for all my books. So very much appreciated! Zoë xx
Filed under books + writing
The Proxy Bride – new book coming
Four months until, The Proxy Bride is out and the book cover has landed at my desk. It’s always interesting to see what the publisher creates for a cover and even though this is book three, each time it still feels astonishing to see my name on the front!
For this book it’s been an honour to write about a part of our hidden history – the courageous women who married by proxy and travelled to the other side of the world to husbands they’d mostly never met. And also of the Italian wives left behind on farms in Australia after their husbands were interned during WW2 and how these women banded together to survive against tough odds and much hostility towards them at the time.
Not least, it’s also about Nonnas and granddaughters in the 1980s when those stories and secrets from the past began to emerge and cultures clashed along with old Italian traditions and Australian life. Of course, while it’s a novel, so much of this book is inspired by true happenings, family stories and even a bit of my own experience as a teenager in the ’80s. Looking forward to sharing it with you! Zoë xx
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Next book out in September…
HarperCollins have released the blurb about the next book! The Proxy Bride will be out on 7th September and I can’t wait to share it with you.
“In 1939, Giacinta sets sail from Italy to Australia. Decades later, a granddaughter discovers the true story of her family… A stunningly crafted novel of family, secrets and facing adversity.
Imagine marrying someone you’ve never met …
When Sofie comes to stay with her grandmother in Stanthorpe, she knows little of Nonna Gia’s past. In the heat of that 1984 summer, the two clash over Gia’s strict Italian ways and superstitions, her chilli-laden spaghetti and the evasive silence surrounding Sofie’s father, who died before she was born. Then Sofie learns Gia had an arranged marriage. From there, the past begins to reveal why no-one will talk of her father.
As Nonna Gia cooks, furtively adding a little more chilli each time, she also begins feeding Sofie her stories. How she came to Australia on a ‘bride ship’, among many proxy brides, knowing little about the husbands they had married from afar, most arriving to find someone much different than described.
Then, as World War II takes over the nation, and in the face of the growing animosity towards Italians that sees their husbands interned, Gia and her friends are left alone. Impoverished. Desperate. To keep their farms going, their only hope is banding together, along with Edie, a reclusive artist on the neighbouring farm and two Women’s Land Army workers. But the venture is made near-impossible by the hatred towards the women held by the local publican and an illicit love between Gia and an Australian, Keith.
The summer burns on and the truth that unfolds is nothing like what Sofie expected …
The author of Mezza Italiana brings to life a unique point of migrant women’s untold experience, in a resonant novel of family, food and love.”
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Sneak peek… next book
The Proxy Bride is a novel inspired by true stories and set between the 1940s and the 1980s in Italy and Australia. There will be angry spaghetti, mixed grills, mixed tapes, Dean Martin on the 1950s stereogram and plastic on the lounge suite and, above all, hopefully characters you may come to love who band together amid tough times for a new life.
To be released 7 September, 2022…
The plaited chillies hanging in the kitchen are on their way!
Buona settimana! 💛🍝 Zoe x
Filed under books + writing
Zoë Boccabella 