Book Review: Eternal

Synopsis:

Eternal is a sweeping and shattering epic of historical fiction fueled by shocking true events, actual historical figures who serve as characters in the book, and the story of a love triangle that unfolds in the heart of Rome in the shadow of the power and downfall of fascism.

Elisabetta, Marco, and Sandro grow up as the best of friends despite their differences. Elisabetta is a feisty beauty who dreams of becoming a novelist. Marco is the brash and athletic son of a former champion cyclist. Sandro is a quiet, thoughtful, Jewish mathematics prodigy, the son of a lawyer and a doctor, who resides with his family in the Jewish Ghetto. Their friendship blossoms to love, with Sandro and Marco competing to win Elisabetta’s heart.

But in the autumn of 1937, their lives are forever changed as Mussolini asserts his power, aligning Italy’s Fascists with Hitler’s Nazis and altering the laws that govern Rome . . . and their way of life. In time, everything that the three hold dear -– their families, homes, dreams, and connection to one another — is tested in ways they never could have imagined.

As anti-Semitism takes legal root and World War II erupts, the three friends realize that Mussolini’s rise to power was only the beginning. The Nazis invade Rome, and with their occupation of the city come new atrocities against the city’s Jews, culminating in one final, horrific betrayal.

Against that backdrop, the intertwined fates of Elisabetta, Marco, Sandro, and their families are decided.

Eternal is a heartbreaking story of the best and the worst the world has to offer. It is also a tale of loyalty and loss, family and food, love and war . . . set in one of the world’s most beautiful cities during its darkest moment.

What war destroys, only love can heal.

Review:

Bestselling author Lisa Scottoline says, “Eternal is the culmination of a lifetime of my work.” It is a story she has wanted to write for some forty years since she was an English major at the University of Pennsylvania and one of her professors was none other than acclaimed author Philip Roth. It was during that first semester of study with “Mr. Roth,” as he liked to be called, focused on “The Literature of the Holocaust,” that Scottoline learned of Primo Levi, an Italian Jewish chemist who survived being imprisoned at Auschwitz and wrote Survival in Auschwitz, his memoir. For the first time, she also learned details about the Italian Holocaust and a 1943 event called the “Gold of Rome.” She relates that what she learned “haunted me for decades, and I knew I would return to it someday.” Finally, after writing more than thirty novels, and immersing herself in research, she felt ready to pen the story that had been inside her for so many years.

The result is Eternal, the engrossing, emotional saga of three friends who grow up in Rome. Elisabetta D’Orfeo is the story’s heart — a young girl from a troubled family who dreams of being a novelist someday. Her father is an alcoholic, but once he was a painter of beautiful landscapes. After suffering a catastrophic injury that left him unable to paint, Elisabetta has watched his condition worsen and her parents’ marriage disintegrate. In order to make ends meet, she works as a waitress at a family-owned restaurant, Casa Servano, where the endearing matriarch, Nonna, serves up homemade pasta and unsparing advice about Elisabetta’s love life.

Marco Terrizzi, is the youngest son of Beppe and Maria. Beppe was a champion cyclist and wants his two youngest sons, Marco and his brother Aldo, to train to follow in his footsteps. But neither of them feel called to cycling. Marco, like his father, believes in fascism, and secures a job working for Commendatore Buonacorso, a powerful Fascist officer. Eldest son Emedio is a Catholic priest assigned to work at the Vatican. Aldo is harboring a secret that, if discovered, will endanger him and the family.

Sandro Simone is a kind, introspective mathematician who looks forward to his internship at the university under the guidance of Professor Tullio Levi-Civita. His father, Massimo, is a successful lawyer and prominent leader in the Jewish community, and Gemma, his mother, is a physician. His older sister, Rosa, has entered into a romantic relationship with David Jacobs, a gentile, much to her parents’ consternation. After all, faith, family, and history are the most important things to them, and they live immersed in all three in the Ghetto. The oldest Jewish community in Western Civilization, established nearly two thousand years ago, their house has been in Massimo’s family for generations. Many Roman Jews with the means to do so moved away, but Sandro’s family remains, even though they are financially better off than most of their neighbors and employ Cornelia, their beloved nanny and housekeeper.

Scottoline begins the story in May 1957, as Elisabetta gathers her strength to reveal a secret to her young son with the hope that he will understand her motives for keeping the truth from him. The action then moves back twenty years to May 1937, revealing the story that Elisabetta must relate to her son so that he will understand the things she survived and why she has not previously told him everything.

Eternal is indeed an emotionally enthralling, towering story about the ways in which the three friends’ world gradually begins to change. At first, Marco is a true believer in fascism, anxious to do anything to support Italy’s government and its agenda. He believes Mussolini to be a great, brave leader and is anxious to rise up the ranks of the Fascist Party. Sandro craves intellectual pursuits — and Elisabetta’s heart. As does Marco, but the competition between them is not malicious or mean-spirited. They are friends first and foremost, and no matter which of them ends up earning Elisabetta’s devotion, they vow to remain friends.

With Elisabetta, Scottoline has crafted a strong female protagonist. Elisabetta lovingly cares for her father, understanding how losing the ability to express himself as an artist broke his spirit, just as she is devoted to her two friends and resists being rushed into deciding to which of them she will commit her future. Around them, the world begins to be a dark place as Mussolini and the Fascists begin enacting a series of Race Laws that discriminate against and increasingly dehumanize Jews. Little by little, their rights are stripped away, along with their occupations and professions, financial holdings, possessions, and ability to live anything resembling a normal life. Elisabetta and Marco watch, horrified, as Sandro and all other Jewish students and faculty are expelled from every school and university in Italy, and his parents are prohibited from practicing their professions. Despite the fact that anti-Semitism had never been part of the Fascist belief system, the three and their families are left reeling when Mussolini decides to align with Hitler, adopting the Nazi agenda in a failed power-grab. Things only get worse when the Nazis invade Rome and subject the Jews to unspeakable atrocities that Scottoline depicts through the experiences and reactions of her characters, including the “Gold of Rome” and eventual rastrellamento (rounding up) of the Ghetto inhabitants. As in other parts of Europe, the Nazis’ goal was to eradicate the Roman Jews.

Scottoline’s decades of research make Eternal emotionally rich and deeply resonant. Real historical figures appear as supporting characters in the story, including Professor Levi-Civita, the “Einstein of Italy,” and Dr. Giovanni Borromeo, a physician who devised an ingenious ruse to trick the Nazis and save his Jewish patients, as depicted in the book, as well as Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty, the “Scarlet Pimpernel of the Vatican” who disguised himself and hid Jews from the Nazis. The character of Nonna is lovingly based on Scottoline’s own mother, Mary, who was, like Nonna, a pasta professoressa with strong opinions. The story unfolds in the locations where the actual events occurred, all of which Scottoline visited, and they practically become, along with the food that is so much a part of the story, characters in their own right. Scottoline deftly uses the locales and food to dramatically illustrate the profound ways in which the characters’ lives change. Sandro and his family go from sitting down to delicious, plentiful dinners prepared by Cornelia, shared at the family table where conversations are had and decisions made, to practically starving but for the generous and risky assistance rendered them by true friends who dare to defy the Nazis and their evil machinations. Likewise, she depicts the difficulty Nonna and other business owners encounter getting supplies to keep their restaurants and cafes operating so that they can provide for their families as Italy inches closer to war.

Scottoline is not a plotter, admitting that when she sits down to write, she does not always know what direction her story will go. That is not evident in Eternal, which is a cohesive tale that proceeds in a linear manner with increasingly difficult to absorb plot twists based on the true history of Rome. Her characters are fully developed, credible, and compelling, especially Elisabetta, strong and determined, and Marco, who undergoes a transformation as the story proceeds that undoubtedly reflects the evolution of many citizens of Rome who were caught off-guard as Mussolini betrayed them and the Nazis gained a foothold in the city.

Fans of historical fiction must read Eternal, not just because it is a unique tale about aspects of World War II that have not been fictionalized before, but because it is, at its core, a well-told, deeply moving story about the resilience of the human spirit. Scottoline’s characters love their home, are bound to and committed to it and each other, and determined that injustice and evil will not prevail. There are villains, of course, but there are also heroes in Eternal — normal, unremarkable people who do exceptional things at great peril in order to help their neighbors and friends. Still, some of Scottoline’s plot developments will infuriate and break the hearts of readers but, like any writer, she can be forgiven because she realistically depicts the devastatingly unfair nature of war.

What is evident on every page is the degree to which writing Eternal was a labor of love for Scottoline, an Italian-American who worked tirelessly to get the details exactly right and do justice to her subject matter. She has succeeded spectacularly because Eternal is a monumentally memorable story populated with characters — real and imagined — who will remain in the hearts and minds of readers long after they finish reading the book. Indeed, Scottoline bestows her “ultimate acknowledgment” upon the memories of the Italian Jewish victims of the Holocaust and their families, noting, “I hope I have honored them and their story, because that matters the most to me.” She most definitely has.

Rome, as magnificent as she was, was merely a bystander to the glory and horror wrought by man, and that was the way of the world now and forever.
Was was eternal, but so was peace.
Death was eternal, but so was life.
Darkness was eternal, but so was light.
Hate was eternal, but above all, so was love.

Excerpt from Eternal

Chapter One

Elisabetta

~~ May 1937 ~~

Elisabetta made up her mind. Marco Terrizzi would be her first kiss. She watched him doing bicycle tricks by the river, riding on his back tire, his head thrown back in laughter, his teeth white against his tanned face. His thick, dark hair shone with pomade in the sun, and his legs were knotted with muscles inside the baggy shorts of his uniform. He rode with joy and athleticism, achieving a masculine grace. Marco Terrizzi had sprezzatura, a rare and effortless charm that made him irresistible.

Elisabetta couldn’t take her eyes from him, and neither could the others. They had grown up together, but somewhere along the line, he had gone from boyhood to manhood, from Marco to Marco. That he was terribly handsome there could be no doubt. He had large, walnut-brown eyes, a strong nose, a square jaw, and a broad neck marked by a prominent Adam’s apple. He was the most popular boy in their class, and everything about him seemed more vivid than everyone else. Even now, the sun drenched him in gold, as if Nature herself gilded him.

Elisabetta wondered what it would be like to kiss him. She guessed it would be exciting, even delicious, like biting into a ripe tomato and letting its juices run down her chin. She had never kissed a boy, though she was already fifteen years old, and at night she practiced kissing on her pillow. Her tabbycat, Rico, with whom she slept, had grown accustomed to her routine, as cats endure the silliness of young girls.

Elisabetta had no idea how to make Marco think of her as more than a friend. She usually achieved what she set her mind to, getting good grades and such, but this was different. She was too blunt to flirt. She lacked feminine wiles. She had been a maschiaccio, a tomboy, when she was little, which was how she had grown close with Marco. She was trying to become more womanly, but she still didn’t wear a brassiere. Her mother said she didn’t need one, but the other girls made fun of her, talking behind their hands.

“Elisabetta, help, I’ll drown!” Marco raced toward the river, and she was about to call to him, but stopped herself. She had read in a female advice column that denying men the attention they craved drove them mad with desire, so she ignored him, while the other girls responded.

“Marco, no!” Livia called back.

“Marco, be careful!” Angela gasped.

The boys waited to see if calamity befell Marco, but he cranked the handlebars, veering away from the river’s edge. They laughed and returned to their textbooks, spread out on the grass. They were doing homework, having come from their Balilla meeting, the party’s compulsory youth group. They all wore their uniforms, the boys in their black shirts and gray shorts, and the girls in white muslin shirts and black skirts.

This quiet spot on the riverbank, just north of the Ponte Palatino, had become a hangout of her classmates after school, though Elisabetta typically sat with Marco or Sandro, apart from the other girls. Somehow she had missed her chance to become their girlfriend, and it was too late now, for they rebuffed her overtures. Perhaps they had judged her as preferring the boys, which wasn’t true, and she would have loved to have had a good girlfriend. Whatever the reason, Angela and the other girls kept her at a distance, and she tried not to let it bother her.

“Look, Betta!” Marco called again, using her childhood nickname.

“Use my proper name!” Elisabetta called back, from behind her newspaper. She did prefer her full name, as she hoped to become a journalist someday. She practiced her byline at night, too. By Elisabetta D’Orfeo.

“Elisabetta!” Marco rode over, sliding to a stop on the grass. “Hop on my handlebars. Let’s go for a ride.”

“No, I’m reading.” Elisabetta hid her smile behind the newspaper.

Angela rose, brushing grass from her skirt. “Marco, I’ll go, take me!”

“Okay!” Marco extended his hand, Angela clambered onto his handlebars, and the two rode off together.

Elisabetta lowered her newspaper, wondering if the female advice column had been wrong. If she wanted Marco, she would have to attract him another way. She sensed she was pretty enough, now that she had grown into her features, according to her mother. Her large, round eyes were greenish-brown, and her shoulder-length hair was a rich brunette, wavy and abundant. Her nose was strong, but proportional to her prominent cheekbones, and her lips were full. Her problem was her bocca grande, big mouth, which proved a disadvantage when it came to boys, her Latin teacher, and that old bitch at the newsstand.

Elisabetta leaned back on her elbows, breathing in the odors of the Tiber, its water a milky jade with wavelets topped with ivory foam. Swallows skimmed the surface for a drink, cicadas rasped, and dragonflies droned. Pink oleander bushes, umbrella pines, and palm trees lined the riverbank, and the natural oasis was shielded from the hustle-bustle of the city by gray stone walls.

Elisabetta’s gaze found the Ponte Rotto in the middle of the river, a bizarre sight. Centuries ago, the stone bridge had connected the riverbanks, but time had reduced it to only a single arch rising from the water, leading nowhere. Romans called it the broken bridge, but she thought that it was a survivor, standing despite the elements and the Tiber itself, which sent blackish-green vines up its sides, as if trying to pull it underwater.

Beyond the Ponte Rotto was Tiber Island, the only island in the river, barely large enough to contain the Basilica di San Bartolomeo all’Isola with its faded-brick belfry, the Church of San Giovanni Calibita, and the hospital, Ospedale Fatebenefratelli, with its rows of green-shuttered windows. Across from the hospital was Bar GiroSport, which Marco’s family owned and lived above. Elisabetta lived only a few blocks away from him in Trastevere, the bohemian neighborhood that she and her father loved. Unfortunately, her mother had ceased loving anything.

It was then that Elisabetta spotted Sandro Simone striding toward her and the others. Sandro was her other best friend, and Marco’s, too, as the three of them had been a trio since childhood. Sandro walked with his characteristically lanky stride, and his light brown curls blew back from his long, lean face. He was handsome in his own way, his features more refined than Marco’s and his build like a sharpened pencil, slim but strong, the way a wire cable supports a modern bridge.

“Ciao, Elisabetta!” Sandro reached her, smiling and taking off his fez. He wiped the sweat from his brow, slid off his backpack, and sat down. His eyes, a brilliant azure color with long eyelashes like awnings, narrowed against the sunlight. His nose was long and aquiline, and his lips finely etched into his face. Sandro lived on the east side of the river in the Jewish quarter, called the Ghetto, and throughout their childhood, Elisabetta, Sandro, and Marco had traveled back and forth on an axis from Trastevere to Tiber Island and the Ghetto, riding bikes, playing football, and generally acting as if Rome were their private playground.

“Ciao, Sandro.” Elisabetta smiled, happy to see him.

“I stopped to get us a snack. Have one.” Sandro produced a paper bag from his backpack and opened its top, releasing the delicious aroma of suppl“, rice croquettes with tomato sauce and mozzarella.

“Grazie!” Elisabetta picked up a suppl“ and took a bite. The breading was light, the tomato sauce perfectly salty, and the mozzarella hot enough to melt on her tongue.

“Where’s Marco? I brought some for him, too.”

“Off with Angela.”

“Too bad.” Sandro chewed a suppl“ and glanced at her newspaper. “What are you reading?”

“Nothing.” Elisabetta used to love reading the newspaper, but her favorite columnists were gone, and she suspected they had been fired. Benito Mussolini and the Fascists had been in power for fifteen years, and censorship had become the order of the day. “All the articles are the same, about how great the government is, or they reproduce ridiculous posters like this one.”

“Let me see.” Sandro wiped his hands on a napkin.

“Here.” Elisabetta showed him a picture of an Italian peasant woman in traditional dress, holding babies in each arm. She read him the caption. “‘The ideal Fascist woman is to bear children, knit, and sew, while men work or go to war.’ It’s propaganda, not news, and anyway, not all women are the same.”

“Of course they aren’t. The newspaper isn’t always right.”

“No, it’s not.” Elisabetta thought of the female advice column. Marco and Angela still weren’t back.

“Don’t let it bother you.”

“But it does.” Elisabetta disagreed with the Fascists, though she didn’t discuss it with anyone other than Sandro and Marco. Those who spoke against the government could be arrested and sent into confino, exile, far from their homes. Informers abounded in Rome, even in Trastevere, and though Elisabetta’s family wasn’t committed to any particular political party, as artists they were congenitally leftist.

“You don’t like being told what to do.”

“Who does? Do you?”

“No, but I don’t take it so much to heart as you.” Sandro leaned over. “Guess what, I have amazing news. I was accepted to an internship with Professor Levi-Civita at La Sapienza.”

“Davvero?” Elisabetta asked, astonished. “You, a high school student? At the university?”

“Yes, it will be an independent study.” Sandro beamed with pride.

“Congratulations!” Elisabetta felt delighted for him. He was a mathematical prodigy, and his preternatural talent had been plain since primary school, so she shouldn’t have been surprised that he would be at La Sapienza, the city campus of the University of Rome. “And this professor is the one you always talk about, right? Levi-Civita?”

“Yes, and I can’t wait to meet him. He’s one of the greatest mathematicians of our time. He developed tensor calculus, which Einstein used in his theory of relativity. In fact, he just got back from seeing him in America.”

“How wonderful. How did this come about, anyway? For you?”

“Professoressa Longhi recommended me, and I’ve been waiting to hear. I just stopped by the hospital to tell my mother.”

“She must be so proud.” Elisabetta admired Sandro’s mother, who was one of the few female doctors she had ever heard of, an obstetrician at Ospedale Fatebenefratelli.

“She was, but she was surprised I hadn’t told her I was being considered.”

“I am, too. Why didn’t you tell us?” Elisabetta meant her and Marco.

“I didn’t want you to know if I failed.”

“Oh, Sandro.” Elisabetta felt a rush of affection for him. “You never fail, and Levi-Civita is lucky to have you. You’ll be a famous mathematician someday.”

Sandro grinned. “And you’ll be a famous journalist.”

“Ha!” Elisabetta didn’t know what Marco would become, but dismissed the thought.

“How can you read in the sunlight?” Sandro squinted at her newspaper. “It’s so bright.”

“It is, I know.”

“Allow me.” Sandro slid the newspaper page from her hand and stood up.

“No, give me that back.” Elisabetta rose, reaching, but Sandro turned away, doing something with the newspaper.

“It’s only the obituaries.”

“I like the obituaries.” Elisabetta always read the obituaries, as each one was a wonderful life story, except for the endings.

“Ecco.” Sandro held out a hat of folded newspaper, then popped it on her head. “This will keep the sun from your eyes.”

“Grazie.” Elisabetta smiled, delighted, and all of a sudden, Sandro kissed her. She found herself kissing him back, tasting warm tomato sauce on his lips until he pulled away, smiling down at her, with a new shine in his eyes that confused her. She had just decided that Marco would be her first kiss.

“Sandro, why did you do that?” Elisabetta glanced around, wondering if the others had seen. Her classmates were bent over their homework, and though Marco was approaching with Angela on his handlebars, he was too far away.

Sandro grinned. “Isn’t it obvious why?”

“But you never kissed me before.”

“I never kissed anybody before.”

Elisabetta felt touched. “So why me? Why now?”

Sandro laughed. “Who asks such questions? Only you!”

“But I thought we were just friends.”

“Are we? I-” Sandro started to say, but Marco interrupted them, shouting from a distance.

“Ciao, Sandro!”

“Ciao, Marco!” Sandro called back, waving.

Elisabetta blinked, and the moment between her and Sandro vanished, so quickly that she wondered if it had happened at all.

Chapter Two

Marco

~~ May 1937 ~~

Marco pedaled home from the river on the Lungotevere dei Pierleoni, the wide boulevard that ran along its east side. The sun had dipped behind the trees, shooting burnished rays through the city, which had come to boisterous life as the workday ended. Cars honked, drivers cursed, and exhaust fogged the air. The sidewalks thronged with people, and businessmen hustled to catch trams.

Marco accelerated, preoccupied with Elisabetta. He was in love with her, but she treated him as a pal, the way she always did. She hadn’t even cared when he had taken Angela on his bike. He felt stumped, which never happened to him with girls. He could have his pick, but he wanted Elisabetta. She was beautiful, which was reason enough alone, but he loved her passion, her strength, her fire. She had thoughts about everything, and though her intelligence was superior, she treated him as if he were equally intelligent. Marco would stop at nothing to win her over. He was love’s captive.

He flashed on seeing Sandro by the river today, standing oddly close to her, as if they had been having a great discussion or even sharing a secret. Anxiety gnawed at Marco, and he experienced a flicker of envy at the bond that Sandro and Elisabetta shared, for they were always talking about books or the like. But Marco knew that Sandro and Elisabetta were only friends, and Sandro had no female experience whatsoever.

Marco turned onto the Ponte Fabricio, his tires bobbling on the worn travertine. The footbridge was the oldest in Rome, walled on both sides-and since it connected to Tiber Island, it was essentially the street on which he lived. He dodged businessmen and veered smoothly around a cat that darted in front of him. He reached the top of the gentle span and saw that his father, Beppe, wasn’t standing outside his family’s bar, Bar GiroSport, as he usually did. It meant that Marco was late to dinner.

He sped to the foot of the bridge, passed the bar, and steered around to its side entrance on Piazza San Bartolomeo all’Isola. He jumped off his bicycle, slid it into the rack, then flew inside the crowded bar. He scooted upstairs, dropped his backpack, and entered a kitchen so small that one pot of boiling water could fill it with steam. On the wall hung framed photos of his father in the Giro d’Italia and a calendar featuring Learco Guerra, the great Italian bicycle racer. A small shelf held a framed photo of Pope Pius XI, a crucifix of dried palm, and a plaster statue of the Virgin. Marco’s mother worshipped Christ; his father worshipped cycling.