If you were to ask those of us behind the Italian American Podcast what it is that drives us or what keeps us coming back to create a new show week in and week out, it’s a safe bet that you’d get a unanimous answer… Passione!

That borderline-obsessive passion that we share for what we do is a familiar feeling to Italians of all stripes, and best-selling author Dianne Hales thinks La Passione might just be the thing that unites Italians around the world!

In her latest book, La Passione: How Italy Seduced the World, the woman who brought us the New York Times bestseller La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair with Italian, the World’s Most Enchanting Language, and Mona Lisa: A Life Discovered, now leads us on “a jubilant exploration of how Italy transformed the Western world’s most vibrant passions—from literature to art, music to movies.”

In this week’s episode, all five of our co-hosts reunite with this brilliant guide to explore the source of that passion, what it means for Italians today, and whether or not Italian Americans have the same access to Italy’s beauty as other visitors to il Bel Paese.

If you’ve got La Passione Italiana bubbling up inside of you, this is an episode you won’t want to skip!

This episode is sponsored by