How Barbara Johsselsohn Weaves History and Heart into Her Novels -122

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Kathleen Basi [: 00:00:02

Welcome to Author Express. Thanks for checking us out. This is the podcast where you give us fifteen minutes of your time, and we give you a chance to hear the voice behind the pages and get to know some of your favorite writers in a new light. I'm one of your hosts, Kathleen Basi. I'm an award winning musical composer, feature writer, essayist, and of course, storyteller. Let me tell you a little about today's guest. Barbara Johsselsohn loves crafting stories about strong protagonists facing a fork in the road. She is the author of eight novels, including The Forgotten Italian Restaurant, which readers have called heartbreaking and phenomenal and definitely a must.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:00:47

When she's not writing, Barbara loves ballet, both dancing and watching, yoga, reading, and spending time with her husband and three adult children. And she is the proud pet parent of a rescue pup named Albie. Welcome, Barbara, to Author Express.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:01:01

Thank you so much for having me. I'm delighted to be with you today.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:01:05

So tell us, what is the most interesting thing about where you come from?

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:01:10

For me, the most interesting thing I live now about a thirty minute train ride from New York City, and I grew up about a forty five minute train ride from New York City. And I think that's the most interesting thing about where I live. I grew up just a train ride away from Broadway shows Lincoln Center, the MET and going there to shows or to the ballet was just visiting my backyard, basically. And I loved it.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:01:41

That's so intriguing to me because I, I went and I did a a church event in the suburbs, in the New Jersey suburbs in November. And I was just blown away by really how close I was and how people were so casual about going into the city. I mean, it's still a investment to do that, and none of those things are cheap. So my question whenever I hear about these peep about people saying this is, how much did you actually do that?

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:02:04

You know, that's really interesting. I think that I mean, we did it all the time. You know, this was the big thing growing up was when you got to be of an age that your parents let you go with a friend into the city.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:02:16

Oh, my gosh.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:02:18

I think I was I was 13 the first time. And, you know, we had to map out the whole thing, train to Penn Station, walk up, whatever it is, from 30 Fourth to 40 Fourth where the theater was, where we're gonna have lunch, how we're gonna go back. It is an investment, but you know what, for me, for people like me who grew up like this, it's just part of the equation, you know? And I, I will say, I mean, if we're going in, we just saw a show last week and you really have to balance the train ride with the or if you're gonna drive and where to park and, you know, the garage and it's it is a lot of prep, but at this point it's, you know, growing up, it was just part of the equation. I mean, it's a lot easier to go to a movie, you know, take it to, you know, the next town than it is to really go in the city, but but we're just used to it. And I think I go try to get into the city at least four times a month.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:03:16

Oh my gosh. That's amazing.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:03:17

Yeah.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:03:18

Yeah. That's wonderful that you take advantage of what's there.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:03:21

Mhmm.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:03:21

I do remember my parents putting me on a train in Boston to go down to New York City for a flute convention when I was in college, and I was in a wreck. I mean, poor little you you're talking about putting 13 year old on a train to New York and my little Midwestern mom heart is just going better, better.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:03:38

Oh, that's so funny. As an adult, it's busy and there's a lot of people and it's, you know, a lot of traffic lights and a lot of now a lot of bicycles. And you really have to that's one thing I'm always recently learned was to get not only stay away from the cars, but to stay away from the bicycles. But I guess it's probably true of many cities, but it's just exciting. And the theater is just so amazing. The theater district it's, you know, because I I have memories. You know, I go now and I and I'm just, you know, the person who's going is the person who went with her grandma to the, you know, or went with her mom on special occasions. And all those things are so wrapped up.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:04:19

So speaking of theater district, you mentioned ballet in your intro. So I am I'm deeply curious about ballet. Tell me about that.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:04:27

I started dancing ballet when I was four or five, and I really haven't stopped. In college, I danced, and gone to graduate school. I I found a dance school near my school, And I dance as an adult also. There's something about dance that taps into, I mean, you know, it's rhythmic and it's even mathematic in a way because when you're following choreography, it's kind of an eight beats per the combination when it might be four sets of eight counts or something. So it's there's an intellectualness to it.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:05:04

Well, they say that crossing the body, the things that cross the body are good for, warding off dementia. So I think about that a lot for myself and because I have a daughter with a disability who is gonna be prone to that as she gets older. So I think about that a lot. I mean, there's a lot of good about dance.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:05:19

It really is in that way. It really is a whole body experience because you are thinking and, you know, and you are moving, and there is muscle memory, but there's also intention. So I really enjoy it. And, you know, again, I grew up going to The Nutcracker at Lincoln Center every year. And now, you know, I've always taken my kids there too. And, mean, I guess this is true probably of anything. Maybe it's also true with you and your music, but when you're doing something that mirrors what you've seen professionals do, it's just very exciting. And the classes I take now are all women in my age group who have been dancing forever, and we still wanna get it right.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:06:04

And we still wanna get that double pirouette. Yeah. You know, not just the single one, but the double one or the, you know, the Fuerte or the, you know, get that leap higher. It's, you know, there's always more to do. And the next challenge to go after, and it's beautiful. It's just beautiful. I mean, dance is just beautiful. And just, you know, where you put your fingers and your arm and your pointed toe, it, you know, just a pose is just beautiful.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:06:31

And, you know, it's a, there's a language to it. Like with everything else with writing, with music, I imagine, you know, there's like, you know, sit and talk to somebody about the new fabric that a particular manufacturer has for the leotards or, you know, a new style of shoe. There's, you know, there's so much to talk about.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:06:51

Yeah. Let's talk about your book a little bit. You mentioned writing. So tell us what book we're talking about today and tell us about it in one sentence.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:06:59

Okay. The book we were talking about is The Forgotten Italian Restaurant, which came out in August. So, last fall. And The Forgotten Italian Restaurant is about two women, a 30 year old career woman in New York and a nineties two year old hotel owner in a remote part of Italy whose lives intersect one fateful autumn around food, love, and a fateful decision made one time on the evening of the Nazi invasion of Rome.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:07:29

Okay. Very cool. So first of all, food. As a, an Italian by marriage, I know it's all about the food. So this is part of a trilogy of books, right, that are set in they're all if I'm getting it right, they're all dual timeline books, and they're all between World War two Italy and modern American women.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:07:47

That is correct. The thing that ties the three books together is that in the world of Italy in 1942, in my series, there are three sisters who were separated unintentionally as the Nazis were invading the northern part of Italy, and they became separated. And each book is about a different sister, and their desire, their quest to come to refined each other as they promised each other they would when they became separated. And the modern day heroines are all have a relation to these three sisters.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:08:23

They're all looking for their roots is what it looked like to me.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:08:26

Yeah. Exactly. Which takes them back to Italy and to explore their a secret or a story or some event which ties them into this family of three sisters.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:08:38

So Jocelyn does not sound terribly Italian. So tell me, why Italy? Why this time period?

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:08:44

Yeah. Well, it is a World War II Holocaust story. I am Jewish. I'm not Italian, but I am Jewish. And so these stories hit very close to home for me. I'm not, you know, a descendant of a survivor, but I am someone with a long Jewish history. Now why Italy? That's really has to do with a creative decision. The original story that I was inspired by started at a castle off the coast of Brittany in France.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:09:16

And this was a castle that was very important. It was kind of a creative salon type place that artists and mathematicians and sculptors, writers would go. It was owned by a Polish mathematician, and it was in that family during World War II. And I was really inspired by it. Now as a writer, I mean, it's kind of a creative quirky decision that I decided that I wanted to take this castle and move it to the Mediterranean off the Mediterranean of Italy. But Italy has a very complicated history with regard to World War II and Nazis. And it was an ally of Germany originally, you know, and then when the Americans and the British came in starting from the South and the allies were coming up from the South, the Germans were coming down from the North and it was a question of where you were and who was gonna get there first. So there was a lot of, it was a strong historical context that I felt really served the story I wanted to tell.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:10:23

And meanwhile, there's all kinds of opportunities with food and climate and gorgeous coastlines and foliage and all kinds of wonderful things that lent themselves to the story I wanted to tell.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:10:40

That's very cool. So how do you approach I would think that this is potentially very emotionally charged kind of time frame to things to write about. How do you approach writing like those kinds of things?

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:10:52

I am very convinced that these are stories that must be told and must be remembered and must be shared. Of course, my characters are fictional, but they reflect the themes that were there. You know, it's funny, it's, it's such a good question for me because I just started envisioning these three sisters and, you know, the oldest was the scientist. She's an intellectual. She's the subject of the first book, which is Secrets of the Italian Island. She wants to be a scientist. And then the middle one was the beauty, and she's creative, and she's a dressmaker. And then the younger one was kind of the baby and still kind of finding herself, but she's the one that was into food and cooking.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:11:38

And, and that's, you know, this hotel that she owns, you know, it's a feature of it is a beautiful bakery. And it wasn't until I was well into the second book, and the idea of this was the middle sister, this was the beauty, just kind of made me suddenly realize that I was writing about my father's aunts.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:11:59

Oh.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:12:01

Isn't it funny that I I just started remembering these three beautiful sisters, the middle one and the older one and then the younger one. They all lived they all were immigrants. They had come over. They all lived in different apartments in a apartment building in the Bronx. I mean, I was very young, but by the time I knew them, I think two of them were widows. One was still married with a husband. So basically it was like the three of them are married to this one because they were all taking care of Benny, the one husband. And, you know, the food, I mean, okay, this is, you know, it was Jewish food, but it was food and food, meaning love and food, meaning caring and nourishment, nourishment of the soul, nourishment of the body.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:12:50

And the juxtaposition of that with this time in Europe, when countries were occupied, when Italy was occupied in the North, and there was a shortage of food and a shortage of ingredients, there was no meat. It was hard to get wheat, you know, and the accommodations that the people, the community would make to try to still have delicious food and nourishing food when there was just so little. And this was a factor in this forgotten Italian restaurant, because in that book, this community is hiding Jews and helping to you know, keeping them fed and with such scarcity, and the community is kind of pooling their resources. I have this in my garden. You have eggs from your end. Pulling it together to be able to, you know, feed the people they were hiding. So that became really important to me to capture that that food as a gift and food as a show of love, which is what I remembered. So I mean, that's what I remembered from that apartment in the Bronx was the holidays and the food and the eat, eat, eat.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:14:01

You know? And this transcends nationalities.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:14:04

Yeah. It does. Yeah. Well, that's really great, and we are actually overtime, so we've got to wrap up. Let's ask so really quickly, what's the best one place for people to find you online if they wanna learn more?

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:14:16

Come to my website, www.barbarajohsselsohn.com, and that'll send you to buy links and all kinds of things.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:14:24

Okay. So tell us, what book or story is inspiring you the most these days?

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:14:29

Honestly, I guess it's part of a theme, but the book that is always inspiring me is Little Women, Louisa May Alcott, sisters.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:14:37

Sisters War.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:14:39

Right. Exactly. And compromises decisions, childhood to adulthood, all those great things that are so important to me.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:14:46

Beautiful. That's a great one. Alright. Well, thank you so much for being with us today. It goes by fast.

Barbara Johsselsohn [: 00:14:52

Thanks so much. Really appreciate it.

Kathleen Basi [: 00:14:57

Thanks for joining us today. Reviews help other people to find us, so please take a minute to give us a rating and leave a few words. We'll be here again next Wednesday. In the meantime, follow us on Instagram at author express podcast to see who's coming up next. Don't forget. Keep it express, but keep it interesting.