A GIRL DURING THE WAR by Anita Abriel - Review & Giveaway

 

Author, Anita Abriel's, third historical novel, A GIRL DURING THE WAR (Simon&Schuster/Atria) is a love story in the hills of Tuscany, during the final years of WWII. It starts in Rome, is situated for the majority of the novel in Tuscany and ends in South America.

Rome: 1943, Marina Tozzi is on her way home with anchovies for her father's pasta, when she finds him dead, along with the Jewish artist he's been hiding in their basement. Worrying about retaliations against her, Marina flees to the Florence villa of her father's American business partner, Bernard Berenson and his partner, the famed JP Morgan Librarian, Belle da Costa Greene. 

Florence is full of partisans and Germans fighting for control over the city. Art expert, Marina starts helping Bernard catalog his extensive library of rare books he's hoping to protect from the looting Nazis. But war makes for strange bed fellows and soon Marina finds herself in a relationship with partisan Carlos. Marina shares her artistic knowledge to help determine the value of precious art Carlos is collecting to raise money for the resistance.

As the war winds down, Marina questions all the assumptions she's made. Is what she has believed throughout the war, true? A GIRL DURING THE WAR is filled with history, art, betrayal, grief, horror and love.

Anita Abriel was born in Sydney, Australia. She received a BA in English Literature with a minor in Creative Writing from Bard College, and attended UC Berkeley’s Masters in Creative Writing program. She lives in California with her family and is the author of The Light After the War which was inspired by her mother’s story of survival during WWII.

Thanks to Anita we have one copy to giveaway. Just tell us your favorite WWII novel. We'll announce a winner soon. Good luck.

GIVEAWAY: USA only, please