Sicily, July 1922. In Lentini, an agricultural center in the province of Syracuse under the breath of Etna, a bloody news event takes place, then buried by dust. Among the protagonists also Maria Giudice, a fervent trade unionist of Lombard origin and mother of the writer Goliarda Sapienza. On the eve of the overwhelming fascist affirmation, a heated class struggle takes place in the town between the decadent landowner nobility, perched in the baronial palace of the Beneventano della Corte, and the labourers. In between, on the border of those two worlds, there is Amelia Di Stefano, a woman out of place.

A popular Sicilian proverb states that a caged bird does not sing out of love but out of anger. Amelia is a trapped woman. From Catania of noble origins, she paid dearly for a mistake she made when she was young. Now, betrayed by family and friends of the Catania of salons, she finds herself in exile in Lentini, where she oscillates between the clandestine relationship that binds her to Francesco, eldest son of the powerful Baron Beneventano della Corte, and the charisma of the ideological flame of Mariano Fortunato, prominent personalities of local trade unionism. Around her, the populace, the colors and the voices of the market, the races of the barefoot devotees, the narrow vanedde, the Grotta dei Santi and her miracles. To comfort her will be the friendship of Enza, a country crew chief with a strong personality, the imperfect smile of Tanino, the craftsman friend, or even the presence of Ciccio the cripple, the last of the invisible, who is always with her. The two universes coexist. And Amelia always in the middle, always in the balance. Until she imposes the imperative of a choice. And then nothing will be like before.

In this novel Giusy Sciacca gives us back an archaic and sanguine Sicily that tears itself apart under the thrust of a scandalous, impatient and rebellious modernity that screams its own anxiety for change.