Trigiani has built a following with her contemporary novels, frequently mining her family history for plot lines or colorful characters. Now she turns her writer’s skills to crafting a biography/memoir focusing on her two grandmothers – Yolanda (Viola) Perin Trigiani and Lucia (Lucy) Spada Bonicelli – and the life lessons she learned from them. “Make your own living.” “Loving one good man is enough.” “Take a chance, and when you fail, take another.” “Leave your children your values, not your stuff.” “Be bold. Be direct. Be different.”

Her memories of her grandmothers, as well as the background information she gleaned from relatives (or her grandmothers’ diaries/papers), are stitched together into a quilt of love, kindness, strength and tenacity. This is a love letter to two women who left their stamp on their descendants – even those they never met. I enjoyed it but didn’t fall in love with it, though I found myself frequently thinking about my own grandmothers and the lives they led. ( )

I thought it was kind of cute and endearing like my grandmother. :) ( )

We all have people in our lives who leave a mark of some sort. For Adriana Trigiani, her grandmothers Lucy and Viola had a huge impact on her. Don’t Sing at the Table is a moving and even entertaining book full of stories about these two powerhouse women and I enjoyed it immensely.

Lucy and Viola are two women who lived very full lives. They loved with all their hearts and gave everything they had to their jobs and families. From their births and childhood in Italy to their trip across the Atlantic and the lives they built once they arrived in the U.S., Trigiani shares her grandmothers with all of us. Don’t Sing at the Table is full of stories about the time she spent with her grandmothers, whether it was cleaning cars (which is a thorough and amusing process if I may say so myself), using a magnet to collect needles off the ground of Viola’s factory or Lucy’s seamstress shop, or simply enjoying a drink and conversation on a beautiful summer afternoon. Trigiani also shares bits of the advice her grandmothers imparted to her over the years on everything from maintaining a home, to love, marriage, and parenting and discusses how her grandmothers affected how she approaches her career and her life.

Don’t Sing at the Table wasn’t just a book for me, but an experience. I’m probably biased by the relationship I shared with my grandmother, but I can’t think of a bad word to say about this one. Don’t Sing at the Table is a beautifully written memoir about the everlasting effect two women had on Adriana Trigiani’s life.

**I received a copy of this book from the publisher as a part of TLC Book Tours in exchange for an honest review. ( )

What a treasure of a small book this is. I stayed up into the wee hours of the night because I just couldn't tear myself away from the story of Viola and Lucy and how they operated in the world. To say that Adriana Trigiani benefited from having them as grandmothers is an understatement.

I loved that both grandmothers had a strong interest in some area of dressmaking. Viola in the heart and hard work of factory sewing, and then her own blouse-making business; and Lucy in her devotion to clients and perfection when she became a "storefront couturier." Talented and beautiful women, they understood the value and power behind a women dressed well in perfectly fitted, classic clothing. They also understood that keeping up their skin/beauty routine, social standing and family reputations were tantamount to good life, good health and good self-esteem; among other important things.

It seems Adriana learned so much from them about integrity and self-respect, there's no doubt about that. But, she also learned the value of manners, of going after what you want, of having a purpose in life, of minding your reputation. The specifics of these lessons are ones you'll be delighted to read.

I thought it was delightful and serious at the same time to read Lucy's lessons first on romantic love, then on keeping a marriage strong. Hers is practical wisdom. Her instructions on raising children are some we absolutely could use today. I particularly liked her dictum never to burden a child with adult problems. That lesson alone would change the mental health of so many children in these times.

There is so much to this book. It's humorous, it's character building, it's serious and it's a lesson book on how to live a life with wisdom. What a blessing Adriana Trigiani had in these two lovely women. No wonder she's a bestselling author with fragments of these things to share with her readers.

Those of us who had grandmothers like Viola and Lucy will enjoy reading about them and, possibly, taking a nostalgic trip back to our own childhoods. Those of you who didn't have grandmothers like them will gain something very special in the reading.

5 perfectly heartwarming stars ( )

Before she was an acclaimed and popular author, Adriana Trigiani was someone much more basic — much more familiar — to all of us: a granddaughter. In her memoir Don’t Sing At The Table, Trigiani recounts the inspiring and fascinating lives of her two strong-willed, larger-than-life grandmothers. Blessed with not one but two powerful female role models, Trigiani grew up listening to their stories and learning from the trials they endured. And as she grows and matures and experiences life herself, the lessons of Lucy Spada and Viola Trigiani begin to take on new meaning.

Don’t Sing At The Table reads like a love letter to the women she loves so dearly. I saw much of myself in her pages, remembering the summers I spent with Gram and Maw Maw, my maternal and paternal grandmothers. My family — warm and complex, like so many — has long been anchored by the lessons the women on both sides have taught.

It’s hard not to warm to Lucy, an Italian immigrant who lands in Minnesota with her husband. After his sudden death, she is left to care for three children in a foreign country while trying to keep her own business afloat. In another corner of the U.S. is Viola Trigiani, a warm and hard-working woman who is an equal partner in the clothing factory she runs with her husband. The lives of both women are incredibly inspirational, considering the heights to which they soared at a time when women were still taught their place was “in the home.”

And the women were at home, caring for their kids . . . but they were everywhere else, too.

The ladies’ influence on their granddaughter, Adriana, is evident and moving. While Don’t Sing At The Table opens with long and detailed accounts of Lucy and Viola’s marriages and lives before little Adriana would ever open her eyes in this world, the latter half of the book is framed around Adriana’s own opportunities and the lessons she learns by their example.

Though I was very interested in Lucy and Viola’s lives, I wish there had been a bit more of Adriana in the memoir’s opening chapters. It felt like an information dump — here is the woman we’re talking about; here’s what she looked like; here’s what her life was like. I wanted a little more emotion. Some intrigue. A bit of back story and, in time, better integration of the lessons they learned against the backdrop of Adriana’s own experiences.

But that’s a minor quibble in an otherwise warmhearted tale. I loved the inclusion of family photos in each chapter, which really helped to bring Viola and Lucy to life, and the way that much of their advice would still hold true today. As a reader of Trigiani’s books, too, it was so fun to see the way Lucy and Viola were integrated into the author’s novels. Fans of her stories will delight in learning more about the women who inspired and helped shape Trigiani’s memorable characters and settings.

And if nothing else, it’ll inspire you to think of your own grandmothers . . . and, if you’re blessed to do so, give them a call. It’s fascinating to think of where we came from — the choices our ancestors made that landed us to sit right here, right now.

It’s a thought as large as the universe. ( )