Return to Valetto /
Smith, Dominic,
Return to Valetto / Dominic Smith. - Crows Nest, NSW : Allen & Unwin, 2023. - 358 pages ; 24 cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
A nearly abandoned Italian village, the family that stayed, and long-buried secrets from World War II. On a hilltop in Umbria sits Valetto. Once a thriving village-and a hub of resistance and refuge during World War II-centuries of earthquakes, landslides and the lure of a better life have left it neglected. Only ten residents remain, including the widows Serafino - three eccentric sisters and their steely centenarian mother - who live quietly in their medieval villa. Then their nephew and grandson, Hugh, a historian, returns. But someone else has arrived before him, laying claim to the cottage where Hugh spent his childhood summers. The unwelcome guest is the captivating and no-nonsense Elisa Tomassi, who asserts that the family patriarch, Aldo Serafino, a resistance fighter whom her own family harboured, gave the cottage to them in gratitude. Like so many threads of history, this revelation unravels a secret - a betrayal, a disappearance and an unspeakable act of violence - that has impacted Valetto across generations. Who will answer for the crimes of the past?
9781761067273
21473260
1939-1945
Australian fiction.
Secrecy--Fiction.
Families--Fiction.
Family secrets--Fiction.
World War, 1939-1945--Fiction.
Italy--History--20th century--Fiction.
Historical fiction.
Fiction.
Domestic fiction.
813.6
Return to Valetto / Dominic Smith. - Crows Nest, NSW : Allen & Unwin, 2023. - 358 pages ; 24 cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
A nearly abandoned Italian village, the family that stayed, and long-buried secrets from World War II. On a hilltop in Umbria sits Valetto. Once a thriving village-and a hub of resistance and refuge during World War II-centuries of earthquakes, landslides and the lure of a better life have left it neglected. Only ten residents remain, including the widows Serafino - three eccentric sisters and their steely centenarian mother - who live quietly in their medieval villa. Then their nephew and grandson, Hugh, a historian, returns. But someone else has arrived before him, laying claim to the cottage where Hugh spent his childhood summers. The unwelcome guest is the captivating and no-nonsense Elisa Tomassi, who asserts that the family patriarch, Aldo Serafino, a resistance fighter whom her own family harboured, gave the cottage to them in gratitude. Like so many threads of history, this revelation unravels a secret - a betrayal, a disappearance and an unspeakable act of violence - that has impacted Valetto across generations. Who will answer for the crimes of the past?
9781761067273
21473260
1939-1945
Australian fiction.
Secrecy--Fiction.
Families--Fiction.
Family secrets--Fiction.
World War, 1939-1945--Fiction.
Italy--History--20th century--Fiction.
Historical fiction.
Fiction.
Domestic fiction.
813.6