Don Camillo and the Prodigal Son by Giovanni Guareschi

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His most famous comic creations are his short stories, begun in the late 1940s, about the rivalry between Don Camillo, a stalwart Italian priest, and the equally hot-headed Peppone, Communist mayor of a Po River Valley village in the "Little World". These stories were dramatized on radio, television and in films, most notably in the series of films featuring Fernandel as Don Camillo. WIKI