Writing a book about Invasion of Sicily, 1943

Hi, I am attempting to write a book concerning the invasion of Sicily, the town of Gela in particular, in the year of 1943. I am trying to aquire as much information about Gela just before the invasion and how the attack was carried out upon the city. What I want to know most is how the people were affected by WWII and the Fascist goverment pre-invasion. Any suggestions for source materials would be greatly appreciated.

 

Aeren -- If you are writing a non-fiction work, you should be looking more for primary source materials rather than previously published research, except to the extent that you are trying to build on the previously published ideas. Accordingly, if you speak Italian/Sicilian, I suggest you determine whether any Sicilian newspapers of the period might be available for your reference. If you read the local or regional newspaper for the period that you are researching, you will get a good idea of war's effect on the population. If there are both underground and official periodicals that you can mine, you will have an even better frame of reference.

I also suggest that you explore the memories of living survivors of the period. You have not indicated where you live, but you might want to tap into your local Sicilian-American or Italian-American communities (if you are in the USA) or the equivalent if you are outside of the USA. I am sure you will find people willing to speak with you.

Always remember that if you want to get your book published, you need to bring something new to the discussion. Accordingly, your original research and your original analysis of primary source materials is of key importance.

Good luck!

 

Another good read with some insight would be "Onward we Charge" which is the story of Darby's Rangers.