In this powerful episode of Plot Twist Radio, host Erin Nevius sits down with historical fiction author Lindsay Marie Morris to discuss her novels The Last Letter from Sicily and Beneath the Sicilian Stars. Inspired by her Sicilian American heritage and her grandparents’ wartime love story, Lindsay explores hidden chapters of World War II history, including the overlooked internment and persecution of Italian Americans on the West Coast.
Together, Erin and Lindsay dive into historical research, family stories, immigrant identity, journalism versus fiction writing, emotional character development, and the importance of preserving forgotten voices through storytelling.
If you love historical fiction, World War II history, genealogy, family heritage, immigrant stories, or behind-the-scenes writing conversations, this episode is a must-listen.
Topics include:
• Italian American internment during WWII
• Hidden family history and inherited stories
• Writing heritage-inspired historical fiction
• Researching FBI files and wartime archives
• Journalism vs. novel writing
• Character immersion and emotional storytelling
• California wartime history
• Historical fiction writing techniques and plotting
Featuring author Lindsay Marie Morris, educator, historian, and author of The Last Letter from Sicily and Beneath the Sicilian Stars.
Where you can find Lindsay:
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Welcome to Plot Twist Radio, the show where creativity,
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storytelling, and the unpredictable path of the
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creative life all collide. I'm your host, Aaron Egnatz.
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Hi, Lindsay. Welcome to the show.
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Thanks Aaron. So glad to be here.
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Great to have you. Before we get going, can you
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introduce yourself to the audience for us?
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Sure. My name is Lindsay Marie Morris
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and I write heritage inspired historical fiction, and I have
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two novels that published in 2025, The Last Letter from
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Sicily and Beneath the Sicilian Stars, both published by Storm
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Publishing. And when I say Heritage
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inspired, both are inspired by my Sicilian American heritage
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from my maternal grandparents. That's very cool.
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So what first pulled you towards writing about that heritage?
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Yeah. So I had, when I was growing up,
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always heard stories from my grandmother recounting how she
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and my grandfather had exchanged love letters during the war,
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during World War 2, when he was back in Italy serving in the
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Italian Army, and she was in Milwaukee, WI, where her family
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had settled after emigrating in 1938.
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And I carried that with me, that anecdote, that there was this
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idea that love could survive against the odds over the span
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of distance and time. And I was writing this down as a
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story in a creative writing class that I decided to take in
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2019. And when I read it aloud,
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someone approached me afterward and said, you know, if this was
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during the war, they wouldn't have actually been able to
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exchange letters once the US and Italy were at war.
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And it would have been impossible for her to send a
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letter to someone in the Italian army.
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And that just took me aback and I had to really rethink what I
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really knew about my grandparents story.
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It was this nicely packaged, neat little story that had been
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told, but there's so many things that our grandparents didn't
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share just to maybe protect us from some of the sadness or
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anxiety that they had experienced during their earlier
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years. And so I decided that I really
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wanted to explore that. And I looked at it at first as a
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series of gaps, But then I realized that through historical
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fiction, I could fill in those gaps and I could tell a version
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of that story so that I could better understand what might
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have happened and better empathize with the characters
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who were parallel versions of my grandparents.
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And so just through that exploration of trying to better
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understand what happened, then I started writing more.
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And at one point I realized that I had the start of a novel.
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And I continued. And I guess the rest is history.
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I love that, you know, historical fiction is one of my
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favorites and I, I had someone ask me this one.
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So like, how can you handle that?
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If you're a historian? I'm like, because you know,
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you're in the past and you kind of create what you want to see.
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You know what I mean? You like, that's what I love
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about historical fiction. You can explore so much.
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And I love that it's tied to your family.
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That has to make it far more special for you.
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Definitely, yeah. And it was something that I
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could share with their children and they could look at it as
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something that was not necessarily about their parents,
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but inspired by their story. And I think it gave them some
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comfort as. Well, absolutely.
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So beneath the Sicilian stars, how do the themes like loyalty
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and belonging kind of evolved throughout the story?
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Sure. So in Beneath the Sicilian
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Stars, which was my second novel, I decided, well, it was
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actually when I was writing the first book, The Last Letter from
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Sicily, that I was doing my research.
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And I came across a story about some events that had happened
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primarily on the West Coast of the United States with Italian
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immigrants who had not yet naturalized.
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And so I had learned that those that during World War 2, after
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Italy and the US were at war, 600 Italian Americans were
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declared enemy aliens. And on the West Coast, that
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meant because of the proximity to Japan, there would be curfews
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and that homes would be rated for potential contraband.
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And that also, one thing that I didn't realize was that about
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3000 Italians who were in this classification were arrested,
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and hundreds of them were placed into internment camps, which
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were across the United States. And I had no idea that any of
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this had happened. And so I felt compelled to
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explore it. And I did so with the intention
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of really exploring what it meant to be an American as well
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as someone who's tied to their home country, particularly for
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someone who was growing up as an Italian American, someone who
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was born in the United States to people who were classified in
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this way. And so I decided that I was
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going to approach it from three different angles.
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Someone who's still back in Sicily, someone who is in the
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United States as an enemy alien and is interned in a camp in
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several camps. And then his Italian American
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daughter who is coming of age during this wartime hysteria.
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She's American, but she's branded by the same notion that
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her father is. And so just because of the fact
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that she shares similar DNA to that of Mussolini.
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And so I wanted to show what it might feel like to be within
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each of these character profiles.
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And I think that one of the things that in doing so, it also
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brought me back to my grandparents, even though it was
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this story, was not inspired by their story, but just
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understanding what it might have felt like to be in this country
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for my grandmother, my grandmother when she was in the
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United States during the war. And to feel this, just to
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experience this stigma and to have to combat that every single
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day. And I wanted people to see what
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the the faces, potential faces of these people who were a
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statistic in history. And it's one that hasn't really
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been focused on very much within the context of our American
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history, but it was something that did happen here on the West
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Coast. I'm I'm in Los Angeles, but
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specifically on the West Coast there was the most, they were
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the most restrictions. There was, and I can't imagine
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what it would have been like during that time to be, you
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know, Italian or Japanese or, or Germany then, you know.
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You're. Definitely persecuted in some
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way and I, that had to be so tough.
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It had to be so soft. So I love that you explore that
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because that's something that a lot of us don't explore, We
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don't think about. It's overlooked as far as the
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war goes. Yeah.
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So that takes us back. I mean that that really takes it
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back to the idea that there's so many things that our
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grandparents didn't share. And I think that that definitely
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was the case for the Italians and Germans who basically out of
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shame don't did not tell their their children, their
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grandchildren. And a lot of those descendants
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are now trying to better understand what happened.
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I think in the context of the Japanese American experience, it
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was such a grave injustice with about 120 Japanese
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Americans, largely American born, who were incarcerated for
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the duration of the war in these camps.
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I think that it's really good that we have are finally
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exploring this in history classes in schools that people
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are understanding and identifying with that
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experience. I I think with regard to the
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other nationalities, it was more hidden by the people who endured
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that it was far, to a far lesser degree.
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So I understand why we don't necessarily hear about it in the
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same context. It was quite different.
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But I think that it's important to, especially for people who
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have German or Italian ancestry or know people who were are
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within that ethnic, ethnic group, to look back and explore
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what had happened. Absolutely.
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Absolutely. So you started in journalism.
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How did it? How did that happen?
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How did you go from writing in journalism to a novel?
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Because when it comes to writing, they're two different
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ball games. Oh yeah.
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Well, I did start in journalism and I started initially in trade
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journalism doing business reporting and then I moved on to
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consumer journalism. I was an editor at Shape
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magazine and a another women's magazine called Viv, which was
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has long since ceased publication.
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And I through that process of editing and writing journalism
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and from my training, I guess the parallel that I see is that
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one must do a lot of research. And in the process of writing an
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article that is data-driven, it sometimes helps to capture the
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voices of the people who are experts.
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And so when I embarked on historical fiction, which I
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never would have imagined, I did not think I was going to write
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fiction. But I looked at it in a similar
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way where I knew that in order to get the stories right, or at
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least create the shape of what had happened in history, I
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needed to read a lot of the source material and also go to
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people who were affected and had those memories.
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Go track down FBI files, read things in Italian that using
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Google Translate on each page, but to really pour over all of
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the research, get those voices as well and then translate that.
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And I one of the things, though, that had been the most
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challenging initially was when you write journalism, you are
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writing mostly the facts and inserting quotes here and there,
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but you're not always showing, you're telling a lot more.
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And I think that in fiction, it's so critical to look at that
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in the opposite way that you need to really paint the picture
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instead of just saying someone said something you need to say.
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She bitter lip as she was recounting what happened.
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She was twirling her hair. She was tugging at her necklace.
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Her jaw hardened. All of these things that you
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don't see in journalism. Not necessarily.
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And so I think that there are definite differences, but there
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are some things that really help me as a historical novelist.
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So how do you emotionally step into these characters?
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Because, as you pointed out, your characters are very
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emotionally driven. Yeah, so one of the things that
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I find myself doing while I am writing a what what I like to do
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is write alternating chapters that have a point of view,
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looking at it like a braid, that each person's trajectory is a
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thread and you're weaving throughout the novel.
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And so I, when I step into a chapter, I step into that
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character's role and I take it on as if I'm almost acting it
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out. And I think about how these
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events are affecting that person, given this profile that
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I've created, what their passions are, what their fears
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are, who they love and what they're what they fear the most.
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And I just, it's almost like thinking of it like acting.
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And so you're giving them this sort of motive and you're
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thinking through decisions and consequences using all of that.
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And so I think, you know, if I've got all of these, if I've
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got certain insecurities or fears, I might behave in a
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different manner, I might have a certain tick or quirk about me.
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And so that's how I approach that each character's arc and
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journey throughout the novel. And it really helps to the point
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where I sometimes find myself dreaming as that character,
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which is really can be really jarring in some cases.
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I mean, I while I was writing Beneath the Sicilian Stars,
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there was one night when I woke up and I was so worried about
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Annalisa that she was cold on her road trip across the United
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States. And, and immediately I pulled
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out my phone and wrote in my notes app that I needed to
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address a few things in that section of the book so that I
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could make sure that she was warm.
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So it gets very personal. Absolutely.
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I mean, I know that from my writing too.
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I, you know, they become your family.
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I know that they're, you know, made-up characters, but so much
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time and effort into it, it feels like, you know, you've
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created this real person. It really does.
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So I get what you're saying there.
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So what do you hope readers feel when they after they finish both
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books? I didn't want them to really
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just have a better sense of just thinking about identity and the
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experience of the immigrant throughout history and just to
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consider the challenges that came before that helped shape
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the world that we know now. Yes, that's great.
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That's perfect. So what's up next for you?
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Well, I have a few projects in the works with regard to some
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future novels, but in the meantime, I'm doing a lot of
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teaching. And I am a an educator for Osher
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Lifelong Learning Institute, which means that I teach
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classes, writing classes and history classes to classes of
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older adults 50 and over. And I do this through
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universities throughout the United States, mostly remote.
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And I actually have one next week with San Diego State
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University. And I also do a lot of teaching
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to audiences at libraries. And what I teach, I I teach
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writing from the perspective of my own experience.
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So I do a class called Inherited Stories, which helps people who
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are interested in family history really reflect and mine that
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family tree for historical fiction gold and making sense of
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the gaps in their family stories and writing the story in a way
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that helps them better understand it.
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And I also do one called the scaffolding method, which is my
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approach to precision drafting because I have, through
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necessity, created a framework to help me keep everything on
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track and to meet sometimes aggressive deadlines.
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And so I help people. Look at the project of writing a
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novel as a project, and look at it as the person who is creating
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the scaffolding for what you are going to build.
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Essentially, it's plotting and I for my first novel did not plot
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at all and it took me about four years to write my second novel.
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I had a two book contract. I needed to finish it within
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months, and I was able to do so through looking at it as a
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project manager and creating an outline and just focusing on the
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timeline to create the architecture of that timeline of
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that outline. And so I help people learn
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through my own project management solution.
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That's that's something I need to take because I am the worst
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about plotting and I am so bad at it.
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I keep trying and I'm just horrible.
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So I need to sign up for your class.
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Yeah, so and then the last one of the last classes that I teach
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is more of a history class and it is called Forgotten Voices.
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And the subtitle is Italian Americans Uprooted in Wartime
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California. So more often it's it's that
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West Coast audience and helping them better understand
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California history through the lens of the experience of the
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Italian Americans who were uprooted because in California
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during World War, 210 thousand Italian Americans, Italians who
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were not yet naturalized but living in the United States were
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ordered to evacuate from their homes and to leave their jobs
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behind. In some cases, families were
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separated. And so I touch on that history
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as well as that of the Italian internment experience.
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And it's been really wonderful to share that with audiences in
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this state, in California, particularly those people who
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live in communities that were most affected, and to see people
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in the audience who know this because they have had they've
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done the research into their family history and they want to
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learn more. That's, that's a wonderful thing
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to do and I love it. I, I, you know, I am, I am a
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historian, but all throughout my research, you very rarely touch
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on that. You know, we very rarely see
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that kind of stuff. So I love that you have one.
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Just, I just directed towards that because it's important.
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It's an important part of American history, especially
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California, as you said, because it was far more prevalent out
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that way. Very, very good.
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I love that. Where can the listeners find
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you? My website is Lindsay Marie
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morris.com and that's Lindsay with an AY and Li, not LY.
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And I'm also on Instagram as at Lindsay Marie Morris as well as
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I'm on Facebook and TikTok to a certain extent.
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So, but you can find all of that at my website, all of the links
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to those as well, so. Awesome, I will make sure those
00:24:07
are in the show notes. Thank you so much for joining
00:24:09
me. Thank you.