MARY CHAMBERLIN went to Rome for a three-month vacation, and, after three years, at the height of the Dolce Vita, wrote Dear Friends and Darling Romans. She had become¿in spite of herself almost¿a trenchant observer of things Italian: eating, drinking, births, cats, rented rooms, funerals, grandmothers, motorbikes, amore, especially amore. She had made friends with a complete cross-section of Italian life, including a favorite horse. She had noted, with the penetrating gaze of the American Midwesterner, the vagaries of Latin behavior and misbehavior. But this is no flippant pennyweight book; it is a wise and subtle study of the Italians, as compared to the Americans¿and vice versa. Mary Chamberlin¿s Italians are not cliché-Latins, but living, breathing human beings. Her implied criticisms of certain American nervous tics have nothing to do with the dismal wail of the usual ex-patriot. Mary Chamberlin is an extra-patriot, who loves and knows Rome as perhaps only an American ever can. Her book is brilliantly and unforgettably comic. The case histories of the ladies who have sworn off Latin lovers and founded a society called Italians Anonymous are sheerest of delights. If you like a vigorous laugh that trails thoughts in its wake . . . if you are seriously concerned about America and its and how it earned its ¿place¿ in the world, this is your book. Even if all you want is to be amused, it¿s still your book. It¿s fresh and young and beautifully written, with something in it for everybody. MARY CHAMBERLIN was born in Lebanon, Illinois, and is a graduate of Monticello College in Alton, Illinois, where she was admitted when only fifteen years old. She attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City and had a brief theatrical career, terminated by marriage and motherhood. She moved to Rome, where she has lived ever. She is also the author of The Palazzo, published as well by IDKPress, and has written for television, magazines, films, and newspapers. The script for her award-wining teleplay, The Ascent of P. J. O'Hara, is preserved in the archives of the Steven H. Scheuer Collection at Yale University.