Before anything else, Sicily is an island and, like all islands, mysteries hide beneath its surface, half land and half water. It seems that the gods–and their adventures, desires, and whims–never left the sunny theaters of Syracuse or Taormina.

Along the coast of Palermo and Trapani, the heroic cries of Odysseus and half-divine Heracles still echo over the immense blue sea. At dusk, amid the cicadas and fireflies, one can faintly hear Persephone in the roar of the waves crashing onto the craggy rocks, the subterranean rumbling of Hephaestus’ glowing forges.