In her latest and 18th book, Adriana Trigiani pays tribute to her late mother, the Big Band Era and the Jersey Shore. Trigiani has written a book a year since 2000 and has also done a couple of screenplays. The latest is a family saga, tracing one woman's life from just after she's out of high school to her death as an old woman. In this passage from "Tony's Wife, Harper, pp 496, $28.99) readers are introduced to the main character.

"Chi Chi Donatelli's feet sank so deeply into the cool, wet sand, she closed her eyes and imagined them taking root below the silt, embedding themselves into the earth and spreading into tangled vines of curlicues, multiplying until they covered the ocean floor. That's the effect Count Basie's music had on her. His lush orchestrations filled the spaces of the world for her until there was nothing left as she listened to Swingin' the Blues on WBGO out of Newark.