Jitterbug

It was an entirely different world in Fifties' America. Enter here ... dance with us.

Vincente Bonaventura, an Italian gentleman farmer/tailor from the bayous of Louisiana sets out, after his beloved wife dies of Cholera, to make his fortune in something other than farming. His mother offers to raise his newborn daughter, Julietta. He refuses and insists on taking her with him.

He becomes a door-to-door salesman, selling everything he can from coast to coast, but runs into some misfortune to the tune of an old childhood "friend" who stashes uncut cocaine in his car from time to time.

We travel with Vince and his daughter (and their rescued bulldog puppy) for eight years as they try to shake this cartel end their role as unwilling drug mules.

This book follows the three of them from the deep south to the east coast to Mexico and on to Chicago where they finally find some peace. 

See the Sixties sequel by the same author, Tie Dye. Julie as a smart, socially-conscious teenage hippie chick.