Return to Valetto

April 1, 2023
A grieving widower uncovers some long-buried family secrets in his mother's native village in Italy. Six years after historian Hugh Fisher's wife died from cancer, her shoes are still in his closet, and his daughter, Susan, asks him bluntly if he ever plans to be happy again. After his well-regarded book about vanishing Italian towns garners Hugh several invitations to speak at Italian universities, Susan deplores his decision to spend six months there as yet another example of his wallowing in the past. But his plan to base himself in Valetto, the tiny village where his aging aunts still live, is upended when he learns that the cottage he inherited from his mother--her death is another recent trauma--is being occupied by someone his outraged Aunt Iris calls "a squatter." Milanese chef Elisa Tomassi claims that her family was promised the cottage as recompense for assisting Hugh's grandfather, who left his wife and daughters to join the anti-Fascist resistance during World War II and never returned. Veteran novelist Smith deftly weaves multiple themes of abandonment and loss throughout a compelling narrative studded with gorgeous descriptions of the Italian landscape and sharp character sketches; each of Hugh's three aunts comes to life with ornery individualism, as do their indefatigably cheerful caretaker, Milo; his long-suffering wife, Donata; and other secondary characters. Hugh and Elisa are drawn to each other even as their separate agendas and individual psychic wounds threaten to keep them apart. A late-novel revelation about long-ago wrongdoing brings an overdue reckoning for a local fascist and enables Hugh to make peace with the mother he never felt he really knew. Nonetheless, Hugh acknowledges, "History does not offer us closure. It offers us the inscrutability of the present." As this absorbing novel closes, Smith's engaging protagonist seems ready to embrace this inscrutability and move on with his life. More fine work from a gifted storyteller: engrossing, well written, and affecting.

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April 24, 2023
Smith (The Electric Hotel) unspools an intriguing saga of wartime promises and trauma. In 2011, widower Hugh Fisher leaves his home in Michigan for a sabbatical in Valetto, the Umbrian village of his deceased Anglo Italian mother, Hazel. There, he discovers a chef named Elisa Tomassi occupying his mother’s cottage, which he inherited. Elisa claims Hugh’s resistance fighter grandfather gave it to her family while on his deathbed during WWII. Hugh’s three widowed aunts, who never knew what happened to their father, call in lawyers to dispute Elisa’s story. Hugh’s 99-year-old grandmother, meanwhile, insists Hugh travel to the village where her husband was buried to get to the bottom of things. There, he meets Alessia, Elisa’s mother, who spent part of the war as a child refugee in the Serafino villa. Alessia shares the decades-long correspondence she had with Hazel and reveals she and Hazel were tortured by Valetto’s sole fascist party member, Silvio Ruffo. Hugh, shaken by what he’s uncovered, returns to the villa and schemes with his aunts to confront Silvio, who is still alive at 96. The characters are vividly drawn, and the plot’s low-grade tension grows taut as Hugh works himself up to the final showdown. This intelligent family drama will keep readers turning the pages. Agent: Emily Forland, Brandt & Hochman Literary.

May 15, 2023
Widowed professor Hugh Fisher "specializes in abandonment." His field is deserted places, ghostly time capsules of the past, such as the Italian town of Valetto, where he spent his summers as a child and now visits on sabbatical, attempting to collect himself after his wife's death. Following a devastating earthquake in 1971, all abandoned the town, except for a handful of inhabitants including Hugh's three aunts, ancient grandmother, and a recently arrived squatter in the cottage Hugh has inherited from his cipher of a mother. Devastating family secrets are unearthed as Hugh delves into events dating back to WWII. Smith (The Electric Hotel, 2019) uses elegant metaphors and brings Valetto to life with a gift for symmetry and a dash of humor. His sense of place is strong, from geography to the tenor of the people, such as Aunt Violet, who dresses for dinner in her crumbling villa as if she were headed to the opera but is also a rabid fan of pro wrestling. This accomplished novel offers engaging characterization paired with echoes of the past that resound in the present.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

January 24, 2023
This is the sixth novel from Australian-American author Dominic Smith, perhaps best known locally for his 2017 ABIA-winning novel The Last Painting of Sara de Vos. The fictional Valetto, in Umbria, is an almost-deserted hilltop town. It’s home to a decaying villa inhabited by a tribe of English-Italian widows, and mysteries from the past that keep bubbling their way to the surface. Our trustworthy and sympathetic narrator is Hugh Fisher, a widowed historian and father who specialises in abandoned places. As nephew and grandson of the women in the villa, he spent long childhood summers in Valetto on holiday from Michigan. When he returns to the Italian town for an extended visit for academic purposes and his grandmother’s 100th birthday, he faces the intrusion of an audacious visitor who unexpectedly claims ownership of the villa’s cottage, which was left to Hugh by his late mother. This leads to the unearthing of several overlooked chapters of family history relating to the war and the mysterious disappearance of his grandfather. Peppered with food references, grieving hearts and poetically Italian phrases, Smith’s novel is an authentic yarn, with conflict, tension and an enchanting crew of eccentric characters. It ponders how it is that we sometimes don’t really know the people we love, and why painful memories are sometimes kept hidden. Reminiscent of other Italy-set wartime or small-town stories such as The Madonna of the Mountains by Elise Valmorbida or The Fireflies of Autumn by Moreno Giovannoni, Return to Valetto is full of rich imagery and captivating storytelling. It is highly recommended for Italophiles and anyone looking to be swept up in character-driven drama. Read Shiells's interview with Dominic Smith about Return to Valetto here.