Peter Cimini”™s heritage spans the deep hills of Italy to the Long Island Sound, through Westchester and Fairfield counties and into the heart of Connecticut.
An author, Cimini”™s first novel will be on bookshelves and in bookstores in Fairfield County and across the border in New York on March 1.
Cimini was born in Bronxville, N.Y., and grew up in the Clason Point area of the Bronx.
Cimini”™s father and five uncles ran a block-ice delivery company, handed down from their father, an Italian immigrant.
“I grew up with that heritage,” said Cimini. “It was very much a part of me.”
Cimini attended Cardinal Hayes High School and went on to New York University where he earned an undergraduate degree in education and a master”™s degree in health education.
Cimini became a health and physical education teacher in New York City public schools. He met his wife Virginia while working at Public School 82 in the Bronx.
“She was an English teacher; we met and married and in 1970 moved to Newington,” said Cimini.
Cimini became a curriculum specialist for the Newington Public Schools, writing curriculum for 22 years. He retired in 1996.
“I was really looking forward to retirement,” said Cimini. “I planned to keep in shape and setup some raised-bed gardens with some fresh tomatoes and spend more time with the wife and children.”
Cimini also began to plan trips to Europe, once each year.
“I was about five years into retirement and I became aware of something I had not planned for,” said Cimini. “I kept in reasonably good shape, but never thought about keeping my mind in shape. After five years, I really started to see myself slipping; misplacing car keys, unable to remember last names, every trip to the bank meant two trips ”“ one to go back to pickup my hat that I had left on the counter.”
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After a Mediterranean trip, Cimini decided to do something.
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“I clicked off the television program switched on the computer and began writing,” said Cimini. “An hour later my blank mind was staring at a blank computer.”
Cimini was not discouraged and began to tap his family”™s history for ideas.
“I thought of the little rural town called Opi; it was where my father was born,” said Cimini. “It”™s a mountain town in the Sangro Valley.”
Cimini said he subjected his wife to the many stages that his book has gone through.
“I learned so much. At first I had no dialogue, no drama, no melodrama, no real conflict,” said Cimini. “At that point it was a 140,000-word essay. I had to go back, and took two years to learn how to write fiction, to learn how to show not tell.”
Cimini”™s story began to grow around his memories of the town of Opi, a town with a single road leading in. The story focuses on the people of the town holding seven teenage boys captive for 22 years.
After writing and rewriting his story many times, Cimini began to shop it around.
“Looking to find a publisher is a great, and discouraging thing,” said Cimini. “No agent would come near me because they thought it was impossible to hold someone for 22 years.”
Though an arduous process he eventually found ears in Bob Reed, of Robert D. Reed Publishers in Oregon, who found the focus on the Stockholm syndrome fascinating. Cimini”™s project hobby quickly grew into a ready-to-be-released book, “The Secret Sin of Opi.”
“He fell in love with it,” said Cimini. “I got lucky, with one guy that understood.”
Cimini said the case of Stacy Dugard, the California girl who was held for 18 years, also has validated the book”™s subject matter.
Cimini”™s second work, a story about upward mobility of females in historically male held professional positions, is currently in the works.
