Book review: The Italian Correspondent by Belinda Alexandra

I harp on and on about the fact I don’t read historical fiction. But I just read historical fiction. ON PURPOSE! And I very much enjoyed The Italian Correspondent by Belinda Alexandra. I’m helping with reviews / interview questions for someone and they gave me a selection of books and I chose this one because the other options included non-fiction, rural romance and fantasy novels. And – as usual, though I won’t learn this lesson – I do myself a disservice by making assumptions about my taste broadly rather than on a case-by-case basis.

About this book

Rome 1951. Veronica Gold is in the city as the Italian correspondent for Vogue magazine. As the country tries to shake off its dark fascist past and promote itself as the most glamorous nation in Europe, so too does Veronica try to forget the horrific memories of her time as a war reporter attached to the Eighth Army at the brutal height of the conflict.

But just as she hopes to find peace, three men appear in her life. Lyle Cooper, her former husband and an American diplomat who left Veronica for her best friend, the enigmatic heiress Emerald Evergreen; Marcello Fabbri, an archaeologist and former partisan now working in the ruins of Pompeii and with whom she had a wartime tryst; and the dashing Count Carlo Durazzo, Emerald's current husband.

Things become complicated when Lyle is found murdered, allegedly by Emerald. Initially, Veronica is convinced of Emerald's guilt but when she discovers that her former friend could not have committed the murder, she begins to believe that Emerald has been set up.

In her attempt to prove Emerald's innocence, aided by Marcello and Count Durazzo, Veronica finds herself drawn into a sphere of spies and a world on the edge of nuclear war, one where nothing and nobody is quite as they seem.

My thoughts

I inhaled this book and it was almost a very rare 4.5 star read for me, but the ending frustrated me a little. What appealed about this however, was the lead character (Veronica, a likeable middle aged woman), great settings and the fact that a mystery is embedded in the plot.

I really liked Veronica and we spend time with her in the present (1951) as well as the past… between the First and Second World Wars. We are taken back to her meeting her husband Lyle and her growing friendship with failed-actress-who-continues-to-fall-on-her-feet Emerald Evergreen. Both reappear in the opening pages and Veronica is thrown because she’s never gotten over Lyle… who married Emerald after leaving her.

We also learn more about Veronica’s work as a wartime correspondent and as a result she suffered (and continues to suffer I expect) from ‘gross stress reaction’… a predecessor to the current post traumatic stress disorder diagnosis. She and husband Lyle were also united by tragedy and grief.

As this is predominantly set in 1951 and Italy (and the world) is re-establishing itself post-war it feels like there’s an underlying theme of shedding one’s skin… or the past in the case of Veronica. After a long period with no romance, she has three men vying for her love.

I did start to eye-roll a little (I confess) as she seemingly moves back and forth between the men, certain each one is her true love before changing her mind. In the acknowledgements however Alexandra references the concept of ‘three loves’, each preparing us for the next evolution.*

I should mention that I also loved the sense of place which is quite strong here and having been to Italy, I could very much relate to many of the settings and Alexandra also manages to imbue something quintessentially continental or cosmopolitan into the narrative.

This would be a good book club read as Veronica’s relationships are surely fodder for discussion. There’s also something frightening familiar here from a moral perspective – that someone might be driven to betray their country for the sake of humanity. As I think about events on the other side of the world (committing acts of war and having disregard for entire countries) you can’t help wonder if sometimes people need to do the wrong things for the right reasons. (And on that note, I’m also very glad that in Australian politics the Party comes before the person. It may result in the toppling and replacement of political leaders from within their party but it means no one person has absolute power.)

*Also, how selfish is Veronica getting all three loves and I’m sitting here at 58 years of age waiting for number one! 😉