The Bishop’s Villa
The small, secluded village of Le Case in Tuscany is “a nowhere town lost in some nowhere mountains”. Here the villagers wait out WWII, struggling to put food on the table. It is November 1943, and a severe winter is ahead. The Italian Fascist regime has rented the seminary from the bishop for the purpose of detaining the Jewish population, and the Resistance is active with the partisans hiding in the mountains nearby. René, the village shoemaker, lives in the same building as his long-time friend Anna. He lives a solitary life, too timid to declare his love for Anna out of fear of rejection. The widow Anna is grieving her son, who was executed by the Wehrmacht. Grief and the desire to fight back now define her days.
Anna, always there at the end of René’s day to drop in on, is suddenly gone. Her letter left behind asks him to make her home appear lived in, to hide her absence while she is away. She has joined the partisans in the mountains. He shouldn’t be surprised; she seemed to know more than she should about their activities. As for René, he just wants to put his head down and mind his own business, but inevitably circumstances will push him beyond his quiet, comfortable life.
This literary novel is centered on the village characters who find themselves dealing with daily hardships because of the war. Some are actively resisting; others just want to get through another day. Like many of Naspini’s characters, René’s life is small, lonely, and isolated, but meaningful human connections come his way. In a surprising turn, Naspini shows us that no matter how small an act of resistance, it does make a difference. A distressing yet heart-warming novel.
