THE ITALIANS AT CLEAT'S CORNER STORE

THE ITALIANS AT CLEAT'S CORNER STORE is a heartwarming, vividly observed tale of small-town life, exploring love, prejudice and identity in the wake of World War II. It's very wry and beautifully observed and should have commercial appeal.

It charts the growing friendship between Connie Farrington, a 17-year-old shop-assistant at Cleat's Corner Store, and the immigrant Onorati brothers, recently arrived from Italy with their father, to work the farm where he was once a prisoner of war. As the story moves between the brothers' life in their Italian village during World War II and the post-war British community of Leyton, it unveils the similarities between the two places. Life in one village mirrors the other, and hunting, gossip, religion and art are pivotal in both.

Jo Riccioni was born in the UK to an Italian father and English mother. She worked in Singapore and Paris before settling in Sydney, and she has a master's degree in literature from Leeds University. Her short stories have been read on the BBC and Radio National, and published in The Best Australian Stories 2010 and 2011. Her story ‘Can't Take the Country out of the Boy' has been optioned for a short film.