Other Side of Como , livre ebook

Eyewear Publishing - Mara G. Fox

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134 pages

English

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Description

Beginning in 1931, amongst the dreary slums of London's docklands, The Other Side Of Como takes us on an exciting journey across mid-century Europe as it suffers the greatest war ever known. Based on true events, this is the thrilling story of Vivian, a young woman who leaves home and family for love. Love of a man, but also love of Northern Italy - the rich landscape of the Grigna mountains; the lakes Como, Maggiore, Lugano; and the prosperous industrious city of Milan. When the shadow of Fascism draws over Italy, Vivian must watch as her happiness is gradually destroyed, and her family is pulled deeper into danger.

Sujets

Historical fiction

Informations

Publié par	Eyewear Publishing
Date de parution	05 juillet 2020
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781839780325
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	1 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0250€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

First published in 2018
by Eyewear Publishing Ltd
Suite 333, 19-21 Crawford Street
London, W1H 1PJ
United Kingdom
Cover design and typeset by Edwin Smet
Printed in England by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall
ISBN: 9781839780325
All rights reserved
2020 Mara G. Fox
The right of Mara G. Fox to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
FIAT La nuova Balilla - per tutti, eleganza della Signora. The new Fiat Balilla, Dudovich, Marcello (1878-1962). Credit: De Agostini Picture Library/Bridgeman Images.
Pagani s Restaurant, Great Portland St (T138) with thanks to Westminster City Archives. Ruskin Window, St Giles Church, Camberwell Green, with thanks to St Giles Church.

This book is a fictional account of a true story and real historical events, drawn from a variety of sources, including published materials and actual locations. No resemblance to persons living or dead should be inferred, as characters are either the product of the author s imagination or are used fictitiously.
WWW.EYEWEARPUBLISHING.COM
To my husband Jan and our two daughters, Kasia and Lucy.
Special thanks to Rupert Prior for his support in the early stages of this project and to Professor Jonathan Steinberg for his enthusiasm and provision of translations from Italian to English.
Mara G. Fox was born in London, spent a childhood in Brighton and now lives in Cambridge. She has a BA in English and European Thought and Literature and an MA in Modern British Literature, was called to the Bar in 1990 and practised as a criminal barrister for 20 years. Based on her mother s experiences in Italy during World War II, this is her first novel.
Contents
Preface
Prologue
London: January 1931 to March 1932
Italy: March 1932 to June 1940
Italy: July 1940 to July 1943
Bibliography
Preface
Every once in a while, an absolutely unique book appears, and The Other Side Of Como belongs firmly in that category. This novel, based on real events, tells the story of Vivian: a young Englishwoman who falls in love with a handsome Italian in 1930s Camberwell, and, with her husband, sets out to make a new life in Northern Italy. Settling in the centre of a loving Italian family, they run a successful bakery in a beautiful, small village amongst the idyllic lakes and mountains of Lombardy. But then a fascist movement sets up its regime, and the young husband becomes a sympathiser of the anti-fascist resistance. His unbending commitment to that resistance destroys his love, his family and his ties to his wife and children.
Mara G. Fox reconstructs the life of her family by setting it in the context of fascism. Using contemporary photographs, War Office documents and Mussolini s powerful speeches alongside her family sources, she fuses historical texts with the memories and experiences of her own mother and stepfather in the horrors of the Second World War in Italy, in a work that has no parallel in contemporary literature.
The story is historically correct, but no less moving and terrifying for that. Fox illustrates her family s history and that of the country in which they lived, the physical beauty of northern Italy, and the rich array of characters in the community: fascism dividing the society, the family and the young couple.
The Italian war is largely unknown in the English-speaking world and, in my experience, this book is without equal in presenting the intimate experience. Fox has the gift to describe public and private matters, people who act bravely and others who, for complex reasons, get into uniforms and become enemies. I recommend it to English-speaking readers for its richness, humanity and uniqueness as a story.
Jonathan Steinberg, Emeritus Fellow, Trinity Hall,
Cambridge, 18 April 2018

MAP OF COMO AREA

MAP OF ITALY AT WAR
Prologue
No wheels, no pull-along handle, no zip, no inside pocket. A thoroughly unmodern affair, this black leather suitcase definitely looks old - it s clearly of another time. Rectangular, about the size of a school desk, the edges and corners of the lid are coming apart to reveal the frayed layer of felt between the cracked leather outer and the royal-blue linen interior. The leather-covered metal handle is still tightly fastened to the front by two rusty rings, and the dirty brown International Transport Express label with a big number 38 still clings on beneath it. According to the label, this suitcase has passed through Zurich-Basel-Strasbourg-Hirson-Lille-Calais-Dover to London/Victoria until finally, somehow, down the years, it has come into my hands.
Luckily neither of the locks need keys to undo them and both snap-up catches, although rusted and worn, still open easily. The inside smells musty, filled with the aroma of the past. Papers, photographs, a recipe for something called Torta Grigna , an eye-catching red cloth-covered book and letters thrown about inside - bits and pieces of my mother s life in Italy, a life turned upside down by the Second World War. Behind the Teach-Yourself-Italian book there is a photograph of three boys, all in summer shorts and white sunhats, holding buckets and fishing nets. I pick up the seared, frayed Italian flag, holding in my hand this fragment from Mussolini s time, this bitter memento of the German Occupation of Northern Italy.
Why hadn t I opened it before? Why wait so long?
Here among the detritus I see a letter from her eldest son, Leonardo, asking her to send him a particular book for his German lessons, telling her he misses her but he is alright. Saying he loves her. There is no address on the top but at least a location - Mandello. A place to start the hunt for a lost history of an English woman living through difficult times.
A mother hardly known.
London
January 1931 to March 1932
Blushing like a hot coal at night, the bright red book sits comfortably in the stout man s hand as he bursts through the door. Vivian Ford starts and sits bolt upright on her chair, her reverie brutally interrupted by the jangling brass bell and cold blast accompanying him.
It s filthy out there, he says, forcing the door shut, stamping his feet as he folds his dripping umbrella. He squelches through to the reception desk and presents the book to her. I d like this repaired - look, it s coming apart along the spine, he says, passing it to her. Just here.
She takes the book gingerly into her right hand as though she expects it to burn her, examining it from different angles. Yes, it is in a bad way, isn t it? she replies, putting it down gently. It ll take about a month, as we re a bit behind.
He looks across his wide fleshy nose at her. Oh. That s not like Mason s. Still, never mind. There s no hurry, as I m not due to go again until September.
As she slides the costings folder across the desk she glances at the title: Baedeker s NORTHERN ITALY.
Waving his fat arm he glances down at her. Don t worry. I know roughly how much it ll cost. Frowning, he fumbles inside his fur-collared coat. Here is my card - just add it to my bill.
She raises her lily-white face, looking at him with expressionless violet eyes, which fluster him enough to ask, Are you new here?
A thin smile splits her lips as she replies, I ve been here for six months.
He looks away. Must have started just before I came back from my last trip I suppose. He turns for the door, flipping his left hand in the air. Anyway, let me know when it s ready.
As the door closes she gets up and walks over to the window to stare out at tenacious city grime. White calcified deposits encrust the slimy brick wall opposite and mossy tufts, leeching water, hang about the crevices. The sky casts a slate-grey light down the alleyway opposite and yet the gloom does not hide the bits of rubbish that have been swept up in the vortex of the bitter wind. It s as though the cloud is sitting right on top of her head, bearing down on her, squeezing her heart. Vivian narrows her eyes to focus onto the window itself, onto a particular raindrop slipping down the glass leaving a runnel. She sighs. It s so boring, totally boring, being a receptionist. And she is utterly sick of that miserable wall staring back at her.
Turning abruptly back towards the invitingly compact book, still glowing like a burning ember in the half-light, she picks it up with her right hand and strokes it with her left hand, caressing the cloth cover. Slowly she traces the middle finger along the gold lettering on the front before cautiously opening it up. On the inside page she reads that this Handbook for Travellers by Karl Baedeker also covers Florence, Ravenna and Pisa and that it has 45 maps, 59 plans and diagrams, as well as a panorama. Sitting down, she quickly becomes so absorbed in the introduction about time, money and passports that the mournful light of the room fades away until, to her surprise, it is hometime. After doing her raincoat up to the neck, and tucking a coppery curl of hair inside her beige cloche hat, she bends her head against the biting wind, and leaves.
Setting off down the Old Kent Road she can already hear the throaty voice of her mother. Later than usual today, dear . By the bridge, turning onto the Surrey Canal walk, old brown barge sails whip at the wind as black scuffed hulks crunch against the dockside. A rat slinks slowly across a few logs bunched up against the slippery loading steps as she passes glistening stacks of timber, off-loaded from the Rotherhithe tug. Glancing away from the towpath up the alleyways, where the people who work in the Limekiln industries live, in soot-soiled two-storey buildings, she sees tattered children swarming around in small yards. Tired women toil with bent backs. A little shiver snakes down her spine as she looks away and thinks of the broken fingernails of her mother s hands, reddened by the drudge of domestic work - hurt hands that hardly earn enough to get by. Her wear