Daughter of Genoa by Kat Devereaux ~ a Review

by Susan Roberts

 

A thrilling adventure set in the war-torn 1940s and inspired by true events, about a young woman who risks everything to help Jewish Italians flee the fascists, and falls in love with the brave aviator behind a daring secret rescue operation.  

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December 2025; Harper Perennial; 978-0063389984
audio, ebook, print (272 pages); historical fiction

I read a lot of WWII historical fiction, and it always surprises me when I find a book about something that I never knew about.  This book was about the work of the Delegation for the Assistance of Jewish Emigrants, which kept innocent people out of the concentration camps in Italy.  Volunteers to the group worked tirelessly to do what they could to help people survive, and often put their own lives in jeopardy due to the work that they were doing.

Anna was hiding in plain sight in Genoa.  She stayed in her apartment and tried not to draw attention to herself when she had to go out.  She was Jewish, and she was in Genoa by herself.  Her husband had been killed, and her parents and her brother moved to America. When Father Vittorio, a Jesuit priest, first sees her, he just knows that she is trying to keep herself safe and when he offers to take her to a safe house, she agrees because she knows how much danger she's really in.  At first, the older couple offers shelter and safety without question.  When she finds out that they work with the priest to smuggle Jewish people out of Italy, she is anxious to help. They find out that Anna is a very talented forger and she begins to help create fake identity cards.  She and Father Vittorio put their lives in danger as they hide secrets that may affect the organization, but they continue to do what they can to help people escape.

I found this book full of facts and history, but I thought that there could have been more development of the main characters.  The author did extensive research for this book, and it's evident throughout.  She did an excellent job of using real people along with her fictional characters.  I definitely enjoyed the book and learning more about this resistance group that I'd never read about in the past.  The world right now shows a lot of cruelty of one group of people toward another, so it's always refreshing to read about a group that puts their lives in danger to help other people.

Buy Daughter of Genoa at Amazon

Susan Roberts grew up in Michigan but loves the laid-back life at her home in the Piedmont area of North Carolina where she is three hours from the beach to the east and the mountains in the west.  She reads almost anything but her favorite genres are Southern Fiction and Historical Fiction.

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