Kate Caterina: A Novel

by William Rivière

A richly textured and powerful novel of a family and a nation torn apart by war follows Kate Fenn, who marries a young left-wing Italian doctor and moves to Tuscany, where she becomes imprisoned within a Nazi-Fascist Europe with a brother and brother-in-law on opposing sides, a husband incarcerated due to his socialist ideas, and a young daughter to raise alone.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Italy

384 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Born in 1954.

Reviews

[Leah Stephens · Rating 2 out of 5]

A long slog, but the ending made me cry. I could only read one chapter at a time practically because I would fall asleep.

[Katy M · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book is mostly introspection by the title character. Given that, it is odd how little I feel I know her. The only characters I feel that we get to know at all are Esmeralda and Luigi. Every other character is just there for KC to muse about, and not very enlightenly. Add to that an unsatisfactory ending, and this book did not live up to its subject matter.

[Corrina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hard to get through the first 100 pages, but I really wanted to know what happened to the characters, so I continued through it. It takes place in Italy during WWII. Overall, it was worth the read. I fell in love with Italy and I felt like the characters were my part of my family.

[Alicia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall pretty dull, but some interesting historical information about Italy in WWI.