Death of a Serpent

When the police do nothing to solve the murders of three prostitutes knifed to death in 1866 Sicily, Serafina Florio, a struggling widow with seven children, unmasks the killer, but not before uncovering burdensome truths of her own.  It is six years after Unification and Sicily is in chaos. Bandits rule the hills. Waves of cholera kill thousands. The Mafia begins its vicious reign of organized terror, raping a population squeezed by conscription, crippling taxes,…