Book Review: My Souls is Wherever You Are: A Crime, A Treasure, A Love Story

My Souls is Wherever You Are: A Crime, A Treasure, A Love Story by Aldo Cazzulllo is a novel spanning seven decades in just over one hundred and fifty pages. Cazzullo is an Italian journalist from Alba, Italy, coincidentally where the story takes place. He is a columnist for the Italian newspaper Corriere della Seraand a best selling author of history and current affairs books. This is his first novel.

I looked at this book several times before picking it up. The crime and mystery books are not my usual thing, but something kept me coming back to this book. It has history, which is a draw for me, but what kept me coming back is the cover. I usually don’t fall for the cover art when selecting books, but this one hooked me. There is a young Italian woman, a partisan, staring out with a determined look on face and a machine pistol slung over her shoulder. There is a red scarf around her neck . She was an anti-fascist or, by another name, a communist fighting for her country, Italy. She is a central part of the story and the cover explains so much it.

The story takes place in three different time periods: 1945, 1963, and 2011. In 1945 the Italian resistance fighters are fighting the remaining fascist and Nazis in Italy. The story focuses on several people beginning in the resistance fight and their connection to Virginia and a missing treasure. The story is told in very short chapters, most barely stretching into a second page. The chapters alternate between the three different years slowly tying to together the events that lead up to and explain to the murder of the former resistance leader Domenico Moresco on April 25, 2011 which is introduced in the opening chapter.

The short chapters and jumping from year to year takes a little getting used to. However, once the reader falls into the rhythm, the story flows well and is easy to follow. The time jumps also help keep the story short and to the point. By limiting the events to basically three days in a seventy year period, focus is maintained to only the relative events and people.

Although short and admittedly drawn in by the cover, I was surprised at the quality of the story and enjoyed the book. There is also a little history in the book too. Everyone who has taken a history class has heard of the French Resistance, this is an introduction for many to the Italian Resistance. The story is quite a web of people and events and will hold most readers attention. A very good read.

Book Review: Shadow of the Corps: A Novel

Shadow of the Corps: A Novel by James Dupont falls in the category of a thriller. It combines a background of a Marine Corps trial in the past and a serial killer in the present. DuPont is a Marine with twelve years of active duty as a pilot and legal adviser. He is currently a commercial pilot and holds the rank of major in the Marine Corps Reserve. This is his first novel.

Dale Riley fresh out of law school joined the Marines to be a hero. One case will change his life and his career. A Marine is accused of bombing an Afghan village with out authorization, killing seventy eight civilians and five Marines, and Dale, against better advice, chooses to defend the pilot. The main story opens with Dale, his wife, and their son living with Dale’s parents. Dale is unemployed, out of shape, and down on life. Almost by accident he sees an obituary for Marine lawyer, the name is familiar: the prosecuting attorney in the pilot bombing case. Here is where the story takes off. There are plenty of twists and surprises in the book and the pace is constant. As the novel develops, more of the trial and the past are brought to the present.

Contemporary novels are not my usual reading, but occasionally I do take a break from non-fiction or the classics and read a modern novel. The Marine Corps imagery on the cover drew me in as well as the short description of the book.Shadow of the Corps supplies everything I needed. As a former Maine, I appreciated the back-story. The story telling is more than adequate and easily holds the readers interest. It is a good escapist novel, although nothing in it is far fetched even with the twists and turns. It is a good summer read or great read for those who enjoy crime thrillers. It was an enjoyable read.