It describes not only the story of the estate and its very foreign owners, but also that of the English in eastern Sicily during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Not only was the Castello di Maniace the seat of a dukedom, but the estate had also been one of Sicily's greatest medieval abbeys and played a significant part in the island's past. The book contains maps and photographs from a collection long dispersed - sadly the last Duke of Bronte sold the property over twenty years ago, so they document a way of life that no longer exists. All facets of an unusual Anglo-Sicilian relationship, with mutual miscomprehension usually uppermost, are recorded here, sometimes touchingly.