the wonderful thing about this comprehensive book about jazz and italian input is the connections across cultures and time frames - surprising in many cases - who knew Mae West married into the Italian network of entertainment purveyors from Italy! songwriters, and singers and musicians - this is also a surprising history of racism and how it cut across all cultures and how it shifted - so an important history in many ways. the writing style is plain and clear, no ribbons - just sheer zest at times and glee when talking about singers who are universal favorites of the italian persuasion (yes I'm thinking of Frank Sinatra) - I learned much from this fascinating book.