The Patron Saint of Second Chances: the most uplifting book you'll read this year

Local vacuum cleaner repairman and self-appointed mayor Nino Speranza is in trouble. Without the thousands of euros in taxes that he could never bring himself to collect from his neighbours, the water board will cut the town off. All 212 inhabitants will be forced to leave.

His usually reliable Compendium of Saints yields no answers to his prayers. So, in a desperate bid to save his hometown, he starts a rumour that major movie star Dante Rinaldi is filming his next movie in the village.

Soon, all the locals want to be involved: Speranza's assistant has written a screenplay and the local butcher will invest - each of his fifteen enormous sons is given a role. It seems the only way to save the town is to actually make the movie.

And Nino Speranza starts to think he might have created the second chance they all needed... until word of the production reaches Dante Rinaldi himself.

Funny, charming and incredibly heart-warming, this is the feel-good book we all need; a celebration of the underdog, of family and of remembering what really matters in life.

Christine Simon grew up in a very large and very loud Italian family, where it was considered a major milestone amongst her countless siblings and cousins to surpass their nonna's towering height of four-foot, ten inches. She lives with her husband and four children, who are also extremely loud, and the crowning achievements of her life are learning to read knitting patterns and teaching her otherwise-unscrupulous miniature schnauzer to ring a bell when he wants to go out.