The Light in the Ruins in Bookmarks Subscribers

Feb 01, 2014 Patricia O'Donnell-Gibson rated it really liked it

I read this wonderful mystery just after I had returned from Florence, Italy last fall. My involvement with the setting was quite fun and interesting as I tried to visualize each landmark as it came into the story. First, this is not the regular setting for WWII stories. The Germans had come to take the art that Florence had accumulated since before the 13 century. They occupied the city which was tough enough for the citizens, but their presence also seemed to some to bring about murder and may ...more

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Apr 06, 2014 Doreen rated it liked it

Shelves: public-library

This historical murder mystery is set in two time periods, 1943 and 1955, and the story alternates between these. In 1943, the Rosati family (Marchese Antonio and Marchesa Beatrice, their daughter-in-law Francesca and her two children, and their 18-year-old daughter Cristina) lives in the Villa Chimera on their large Tuscan estate. The two older sons are away, seconded into the war effort by the Nazis. The life of the family is largely undisturbed until the arrival of the Nazis who are intereste This historical murder mystery is set in two time periods, 1943 and 1955, and the story alternates between these. In 1943, the Rosati family (Marchese Antonio and Marchesa Beatrice, their daughter-in-law Francesca and her two children, and their 18-year-old daughter Cristina) lives in the Villa Chimera on their large Tuscan estate. The two older sons are away, seconded into the war effort by the Nazis. The life of the family is largely undisturbed until the arrival of the Nazis who are interested in the Etruscan tomb found on the family estate.

In 1955, Francesca is brutally murdered and it soon becomes clear (from the killer’s interior monologues interspersed throughout) that the killer intends to wipe out all surviving members of the Rosati family. Assisting with the investigation is Serafina Bettini, Florence’s only female detective. As she sets out to uncover the truth, she uncovers forgotten memories of her past as a Resistance fighter, a past that involved the Villa Chimera and left her physically and emotionally scarred.

There is certainly suspense throughout. The killer reveals his next target and the reader wonders whether he/she can be stopped in time. The number of suspects with motives is quite large so there is also suspense as one tries to guess the murderer’s identity. The problem is that it is impossible to correctly identify the killer because information is withheld, though the title serves as a strong clue. This strikes me as a kind of cheating. Furthermore, the killer’s motivation is not sufficiently explained; the need to cut out the hearts of each Rosati victim is not satisfactorily addressed.

There are coincidences that stretch the reader’s credibility. That Serafina should be the one to investigate this case, one which leads her to discover details of an event about which she had only a sketchy memory, seems very contrived. That Cristina would have little memory of that event seems illogical.

Characterization is weak in that even the major characters are flat. Francesca, for example, is the caustic cynic while Cristina is the oblivious spoiled child. A reviewer in The Boston Globe made comparisons between the members of the Rosati family and the von Trapp family in The Sound of Music (http://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/books...), and I must concur. The romance between Cristina and a German soldier certainly parallels that of Liesl and the young German.

What is the strongest aspect of the novel is its examination of the dilemmas faced in wartime. The Rosati family “’by the end of the war . . . were not especially popular. And why should they be? They had cast their lot with the Nazis’” (252). When accused of being a Nazi sympathizer, Antonio defended his actions: “’[The Germans] took what they wanted. They came and they took. . . . I had no choice. . . . My family have been prisoners here’” (244). Serafina, the former partisan, explains, “’The problem for the Rosatis was the problem for lots of landowners once the Germans controlled Italy: if the Nazis believed they were feeding the partisans, they might have killed them; but if the landowners didn’t feed us, we might have killed them’” (88). It is understandable why Antonio says, “’We make compromises. We look the other way. Then, when it’s over, we can’t look at ourselves in the mirror’” (205). The reader can only wonder what he/she would have done in similar circumstances.

Though flawed, the book is entertaining and worth a read because of its portrayal of the moral dilemmas and emotional struggles faced by an occupied people in wartime.

Please check out my reader's blog (http://schatjesshelves.blogspot.ca/) and follow me on Twitter (@DCYakabuski).
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