Review for the Italian American Heritage Foundation Newsletter, the Sicilian Men’s Club and the Sicilian Sisterhood. 

Cambridge Street is a work of fiction inspired by true events of the author’s family’s life. I highly recommend this novel, but the recommendation comes with a caveat. Many of us whose parentage hails from the south of Italy and whose ancestors arrived in America before the Second World War have a tendency to romanticize the old country. This book rather shatters that impression of sweetness and beauty. The book might startle you with its explicit scenes of violence.

If you wonder why, reading Cambridge Street will make it abundantly clear. Decker’s descriptions of the life in Sicily and Naples is far from lovely. Actually, it’s quite horrifying. The extreme poverty, mafia rule, unpoliced violence, ongoing vendetta, the absence of schools and medical care all combined to make life there impossibly challenging.

The Tomaso family, however, will endear itself to you. The great love the family holds for one another and for their faith balances the surrounding evil, but certainly does not sugar coat it. The family had to leave Sicily. Their lives depended upon it. This particular family decided to immigrate to Chicago where they had some familial connections. They ended up in Little Sicily on Cambridge Street, a sub-section of Little Italy.

Sadly, here they found gangsters working hand-in-hand with the crooked police, they found deep-seated prejudice against them, more vendetta and people being gunned down in the middle of the street in broad daylight with no police interventions. This was Chicago of the Roaring 20’s, Al Capone’s Chicago. The Tomaso family landed in an ugly place indeed.

And so, the family once again finds themselves in survival mode. They realize that here, unlike in Italy, if they can get through this transition, there is a future for their children. It’s all about sacrificing so their children can have an education and a future. There are schools for all and doctors when they need them. There is light at the end of the tunnel.

Cambridge Street is Mr. Decker’s first novel and I really have to compliment him on his outstanding character development. These folks, not just the Tomaso family, but all the peripheral characters, especially Father Edo and the satanic Gazzo are multi-dimensional and unforgettable. Mr. Decker’s reflections on the First World War were also very moving.

It was an enjoyable read and the pages just flew by.