In Italy, ordering a cappuccino after lunch is perfectly legal. It is also, in certain circles, definitely an act of culinary treason.

Born and raised in the Italian city of Turin, debut author Linda Di Franco uses her decades of filmmaking experience to bring the Italy of 2009 to life. Leaning into the quirks, contradictions, and endless idiosyncrasies of her fellow Italians, Di Franco brings readers along a journey of gastronomy, romance, and comedic wit.

Set in a small village in Italy's Piedmont region, “Cappuccino After Lunch: Italy, Food, and Other Social Crimes” (March 30, 2027, Kalos Press), follows Virginia Clerico, a disgraced New York avant-garde chef who inherits a traditional trattoria and sees an opportunity to rebuild her fortunes. Her plan is straightforward: modernize the restaurant, sell it, and get back to Manhattan. Unfortunately, nobody has consulted the villagers.

What follows is a collision between two cultures equally convinced of their own superiority. On one side, an American chef armed with molecular gastronomy and professional ambition. On the other, a community where recipes are inherited and innovation is generally regarded with suspicion.

But “Cappuccino” is no sentimental love letter to the Italian countryside. Villagers are as capable of vanity, manipulation, and breathtaking provincialism as the Americans they distrust. Observing this cultural standoff is an opinionated omniscient narrator, armed with a dry wit, an eye for absurdity, and very little inclination to spare anyone's dignity.

Beneath its romantic-comedy framework, the novel offers a satirical portrait of cultural identity, using food as a language of belonging, social hierarchy, and occasionally outright warfare.