carlo cabriotti arrives in america in 1919 looking for the “american dream,” finding it in the easy money and fast living era of prohibition, culminating with his marriage to the beautiful maria. but the untimely death of his wife shatters the dream and forces him to place his sons, matthew and vincent in an orphanage. st. gregory’s home for boys is a forbidding place. the nuns’ discipline the youngsters as vigorously and harshly as any drill instructor, but the boys soon learn to adapt and overcome the adversity of their confinement. they join their classmates in adopting an “us against them attitude,” battling the system into which they were so rudely thrust. they begin to grudgingly accept the many minor disciplinary rules, but “getting away with a biggie” remains their primary concern. crushed cupcakes derives it’s authentic detail and strong sense of immediacy from the author’s experience growing up in a similar orphanage, as well as recollections of his father, who ran contraband whiskey out of canada during prohibition. young adults will enjoy reading of the trials of vincent and his classmates, adults will savor the true to life depiction of a vanished era.