For more than 350 years, Italian immigrants have played important roles in the opening and development of the land that is now Michigan, from their participation in the French fur trade up to the present day. Through an emphasis on the family as the essential institution in ethnic group success, Russell M. Magnaghi celebrates the accomplishments of Michigan's famous and not-so-famous Italian sons and daughters as he documents their struggles and achievements. Through the tenacity and hard work of the immigrants and their descendants, Italians in Michigan have progressed from unskilled laborers to some of the highest positions in business, politics, culture, and education.

The novella was an important medieval and Renaissance prose narrative form that developed out of exempla and didactic literature and contributed to modern narrative forms. This is the first collection of essays dedicated to comprehensive scholarship on the Italian novella. The essays range from work on the Decameron , the epitome of the genre, to studies of sixteenth century authors who often utilized transgressive or sexual themes in their novellas.