Mating Habits of Fireflies (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798990543805)

Artist Emily Rowen experiences the world in a way few can comprehend. She tastes sunlight, hears voices, and sees visions. Even the landscape speaks to her when she returns to Italy in 2006, carrying a special gift for the heir of the estate where she once lived.

Her memories take her back to 1969, the pivotal year of her life in California when she illustrates her traumatic past in a sketchbook. During this time, she meets Danny, a mysterious artist and musician, who believes she's a mystic. She grows to trust him as they search for meaning in an age of assassinations, revolutionary music, and outspoken art. But rollercoaster circumstances lead her to leave the States-and Danny-to study in Italy after he is drafted and doomed to fight in Vietnam. She lives with her collegemates and an anarchist professor on a countess's estate in Umbria where nationwide strikes and political unrest inundate the region during the beginning of Italy's tragic Years of Lead. There she has recurrent dreams of Danny lying face down in the jungle surrounded by the fireflies he loves. Because her greatest fear is losing him, she turns to her art to cope and plunges into dreamlike worlds in an attempt to save him from afar. However, when dangers begin to unfold right in front of her, she realizes she must wake up and find a way to save herself.