I was immediately transported into the magnificence of Italy by the writing of Dominic Smith. His descriptions were evocative. The author describes a tale of unspoken family secrets with poignancy and humor. I loved each of the characters and how they interacted. A melancholy widower returns to visit his widowed aunts and grandmother at the family villa in Valetto to find some peace while he works on a historical project. While there, he uncovers a tragedy from his mother’s past that helps him understand their relationship while she was alive. Along with an interesting mix of well-developed characters, he brings this secret to life and helps heal not only himself but others that we meet along the way. I was completely entranced by this novel.

Hugh Fisher is a historian and is on sabbatical from his Michigan university. He has returned to his mother’s Italian village to write on dying villages and stay with his three elderly aunts who are a part of the tiny remaining population. He visited the village in the past, as a boy and later with his wife and daughter. His mother left him her small stone cottage that belonged to the family villa when she passed away. He has a secondary reason to return to Valetto - his ownership is being challenged by a World War II survivor. In addition the occasion of his return coincides with the 100th birthday celebration of his grandmother, a tremendous fete to which hundreds are invited.

Hugh is fluent in Italian, having learned during his boyhood visits. The topography of the village is realistically presented and the reader learns about the seismic history of Umbria, where Valetto is located, as well as the generations of people who populate it. A mystery is uncovered by Hugh and Elisa, the woman who is contesting the ownership of the cottage, and through this we learn how long lasting are the war scars on WWII survivors.

The book is rich with character development and is a compelling read. For fans of Jess Walters.

This was a wonderful book with an intriguing story. I enjoyed the relationship between the two main characters and the old world sisters and their friends. The book culminates in a party after a revelation about about a crime, and the party’s main purpose is redirected. All of which is fascinating. I would have loved to be part of a book club with this book due to the plot twist. No spoilers here, though. Read it and enjoy.
Thank you NetGalley for an ARC.

4.5⭐

As the story begins, we meet social historian and academic, Hugh Fisher on his way to his late mother's ancestral home in Valetto a (fictional) crumbling town in Umbria. Hugh, a widower, was bequeathed a cottage on the premises of the family villa by his mother Hazel, where he plans to spend the next six months while on sabbatical from his teaching job at a college in Michigan. Once a thriving town of population three thousand, the post-war years and natural calamities ( such as the earthquake of 1971) resulted in a large-scale exodus of families and at present boasts of a population of ten full-time residents among whom are Hugh’s aunts – the Serafino widows -Violet, Rose, and Iris-and their mother, Hugh’s Nonna Ida who is planning a huge celebration for her hundredth birthday, inviting friends family from all across the world to join in the celebrations.
However, he was informed by his aunts that a northerner by the name of Elissa Tomassi has laid claim to the cottage based on a letter gifting the same to her family written by his maternal grandfather Aldo Serafino. Aldo who was helping the partisan resistance, had left his family to go into hiding in 1944, his fate unknown to his family. It turns out that Elisa’s family has another connection to the Serafino family. Elisa’s mother Alessia was one of the refugees the Serafino family had sheltered during WWII, a part of the family history of which Hugh was unaware. Alessia and Hazel had been friends during that period and Alessia had also been close to Ada. While the family and Elisa try to resolve the conflict over the ownership of the cottage, Hugh and Elise uncover much about the history of the crumbling town, the residents and family history including a betrayal and a particularly traumatic incident that impacted both families across generations. As the narrative progresses it is up to Hugh to decide whether to let go of past injustices or see that those responsible for inflicting pain on his family are finally held accountable.
With a cast of interesting characters, vivid imagery and an engaging narrative, Return to Valetto by Dominic Smith is a beautifully written, captivating novel. The author masterfully weaves the history of a town and its people, the customs, food and culture of the community into a rich and absorbing narrative. I enjoyed getting to know the characters, especially Hugh’s aunts. The romantic relationship track felt a tad forced and wasn’t quite necessary, but this did not detract from my overall experience with this novel. The story is presented from Hugh’s first-person PoV and overall, I did like how the plot is structured. Though the story takes a while to take off (around the twenty percent mark), the story progressed at an even pace thereafter and I found this novel hard to put down. This is my first time reading a novel by this author and I am sure it won’t be my last.
Many thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for the DRC of this novel. All opinions expressed in this review are my own.

A paean to the history of a place and one family's history, this novel is full of evocative language, putting you inside the almost abandoned town of Valetto. The title has more than one meaning, based on the happenings in the novel (which I won't share, because I don't want to ruin it). I enjoyed the characters, especially the Serafino sisters/widows. Hugh is an interesting man, who learns a lot throughout the novel, especially about love and moving on.

"A nearly abandoned Italian village, the family that stayed, and long-buried secrets from World War II.

On a hilltop in Umbria sits Valetto. Once a thriving village-and a hub of resistance and refuge during World War II-centuries of earthquakes, landslides and the lure of a better life have left it neglected. Only ten residents remain, including the widows Serafino - three eccentric sisters and their steely centenarian mother - who live quietly in their medieval villa. Then their nephew and grandson, Hugh, a historian, returns.

But someone else has arrived before him, laying claim to the cottage where Hugh spent his childhood summers. The unwelcome guest is the captivating and no-nonsense Elisa Tomassi, who asserts that the family patriarch, Aldo Serafino, a resistance fighter whom her own family harboured, gave the cottage to them in gratitude. Like so many threads of history, this revelation unravels a secret - a betrayal, a disappearance and an unspeakable act of violence - that has impacted Valetto across generations. Who will answer for the crimes of the past?"

Thanks to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus & Giroux for the free ARC in exchange for my honest review. All opinions expressed herein are my own.

In 2011, Valetto is a nearly abandoned town in Italy. Among its ten remaining residents are the three Serafino sisters (Violet, Iris and Rose) and their mother Ida who is getting ready to celebrate her 100th birthday. Hugh Fisher, a historian living in the U.S., returns to their medieval villa where he spent his childhood summers. His mother Hazel bequeathed him the stone cottage on the family property so he decides to spend his six-month sabbatical there.

He learns, however, that a woman named Elisa Tomassi has arrived to claim the cottage. During World War II, Elisa’s mother Alessia was a child refugee given shelter at the villa where she and Hazel became best friends. Meanwhile, Aldo Serafino, the family patriarch, left to join the Resistance and was helped by Alessia’s parents. He never returned home after the war, but Elisa tells of his death and his bestowing the cottage in gratitude for the family’s helping to keep him safe. Ida asks her grandson Hugh to investigate to determine the truth. He ends up learning about some family history involving his mother Hazel.

There’s quite a large cast of characters, but everyone emerges as a distinct personality. I worried about being able to differentiate the three sisters, but that proved not to be an issue. Each has her own quirks: Violet loves watching pro wrestling on television; Iris devotes her time to missing persons’ cases; and Rose sponsors children worldwide. Even minor characters like Milo and Donata, the villa’s staff, are memorable.

The author’s vivid descriptions transport readers to Umbria. The landscape and flora are detailed so that it’s impossible not to have a clear visual of the region. I understand it is possible to buy an abandoned house for €1 as part of an ongoing scheme to revitalize Italy's many sleepy towns with small, ageing populations. Reading this novel left me wanting to relocate to a rural Italian village.

A major theme is the effects of suppressed trauma on generations. There’s a wonderful description of actions flowing “across the decades like a tidal bore coming upriver.” At one point, Elisa speaks about the burden of silence: “’Silence kills us from the inside.’” It is only through exposing secrets that they can be confronted and healing can occur. Hugh, for instance, always felt that he never knew his mother; twice he refers to her as a cipher. When he learns about what happened to her, a secret she shared with no one except Alessia, he is able to understand some of her behaviour. Once he has made peace with his mother, Hugh too seems willing to stop wallowing in the past and re-engaging with life.

Of course it takes courage to speak out. But it is only when people open up about traumatic events that guilty parties can be made to bear responsibility. Regardless of how much time has passed, people have a need for justice.

Though much of the book is serious in tone, there are touches of humour. The eccentricities of the sisters, the feud between Iris and Violet, and the preparations for Ida’s birthday dinner provide some light-hearted moments.

This is my first book by Dominic Smith. His novel The Last Painting of Sara de Vos has been on my to-read pile for quite some time, and I think it’ll be moving to the top. I hope it’s like Return to Valetto which is an example of excellent story-telling, balancing an interesting plot and memorable characters.

A highlight of my reading year so far. With an irresistible premise I had high expectations for this book, and I'm happy to say it delivered in every way. I knew I was onto a winner when I had to chide myself for all the highlighting, especially in the first half. This book is sure to have wide appeal.

Hugh Fisher, an American historian and widower, has arrived in Valetto at the start of his sabbatical. This almost abandoned Umbrian village, sitting precariously on a column of tufa rising from the valley floor, is the ancestral home of his recently deceased mother, Hazel Serafino, and he spent many of his childhood summers there with her in the small stone cottage at the rear of the family's medieval villa. He plans to base himself there while he conducts further research on his specialist academic topic - the vanishing towns and villages of Italy. But in the short-term he is there to help prepare for and celebrate his grandmother Ida's 100th birthday.

Before he has even arrived though, Hugh's plans are dealt a blow by an email from his Aunt Iris (one of 3 widow-aunts living in the villa), advising him of an interloper - a squatter - at the cottage left to him by his mother. The so-called squatter is a renowned Milanese chef by the name of Elisa Tommasi, and she has evidence of a strong claim on the cottage.

And so the first part of the book is focussed on the property dispute. Families being as they are, the Serafinos present a united front to the opposition of Elisa's claim, while behind the façade they are squabbling amongst themselves. However one unifying point is that the dispute is to be kept from Ida, to avoid the risk of spoiling the centenarian's birthday. But as the details of Elisa's claim are learned and understood, a deep, dark secret from Valletto's wartime past comes to light, threatening to divide the family and the local community.

This is a story of grief, loss, family, secrets, ageing and ultimately, reconciliation, told by Dominic Smith with a generous amount of warmth and humour. His writing is sublime (thus all the highlighting) and paints such a romantic picture of this faded but still dignified village and its inhabitants. I absolutely adored it and will read it again one day.

This was a slow-paced historical fiction with a little bit of romance that somehow managed to worm its way into my brain and heart and I wanted the main families involved to finally be okay. The story is told mostly in the present, but the main character is a historian, and he goes back to his mother's family home after her death to spend 6 months researching dead or dying Italian towns for a paper he will be presenting. There he unearths more than he bargained for but is able to find healing not just for himself, but for his aunts and grandmother as well.

The pacing is slow, and there were moments when I wanted to put it down and read something else, but my thoughts kept drifting back to this town and its inhabitants and to what happened with this man's family during the war. It's somehow connected with the family of a woman who has come to claim the cottage his mother left to him, and as he unravels the mysteries, you see him slowly come to terms with who his mother was and all that she endured. What I liked is that the author didn't make it seem like once he understood, he was able to figure her and love and miss her, because it was much too complex for that. But it was more that with understanding, he was able to forgive and love who she was before the events and who she could have been.

While there were moments, especially near the beginning, where my mind would sort of skim over what the author was writing, I started to appreciate his descriptions of the town and its surroundings and I also better appreciated why historians get so excited when they unearth the past. It's a different way of looking at things that I don't often experience.

There were moments when I found myself laughing out loud and I loved the descriptions of the food and the humor the author injected that I assume was very Italian. I'm not that familiar with Italian culture, but I really appreciated it when the author would inject comments about Italian families, especially from one area or another. I found it quite interesting.

Would I read another book by the author? Probably so, if this is a good example of his writing. It was a much slower pace than I'm used to, but I ended up enjoying it quite a bit.

I received an advance review copy for free from NetGalley and the publisher, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Dominic Smith's insatiable appetite results in works of wide flung diversity backed by impeccable research. In this case, his curiosity led him to Etruscan history, including architecture and food.

Here we find Hugh Fisher, an academic widower on sabbatical, staying with Ida, his grandmother, and his three aunts in their crumbling medieval villa in an even more crumbling town in Umbria that is barely inhabited, and giving the occasional guest lecture. Smith uses this setup to explore the phenomena of towns in this less glamorous province, that have been virtually gutted thanks to various causes such as earthquake and the so-called Italy's economic miracle of the 1950's that witnessed huge exoduses and urban influx after WWII. Hugh has already published a book on this subject -- deserted towns, fascinated by some that were vacated due to earthquake, leaving them a version of a modern day Pompeii ("... looking for clues about the lives that had once animated [these rooms]...". ("All these rooms had a damp mineral smell that made me lightheaded and that I have always associated with the sorrows of the past.") As preparations proceed for Ida's 100th birthday, he unearths secrets relating to events from WWII that upend his world, and it is in these plot points that Smith really shines. I have noted before that that war has been so thoroughly mined and outrage can only be reached in works of originality, well written and immersive, and he has managed to do that. Highly recommended.

Historian Hugh returns to his ancestral villa in Valetto, Italy for his grandmother's 100th birthday. The crumbling villa where his widowed aunts and grandmother live is one of the few inhabited homes in this nearly abandoned town. The immediate threat though is not another earthquake that will send what is left of the town tumbling to its depths. Instead, the threat comes from Elisa who shows up to claim that cottage that has been passed down to Hugh after his mother died. The arrival of Elisa and her claim leads to uncovering of family secrets and a past they thought they left behind.

Return to Valetto is not historical fiction, but it does deal an awful lot with history. This is also not a dual timeline story which I felt was a great choice for this story and kind of refreshing. I've read a few books where the present-day family discovers an unknown history of their WWII relative, but they have almost always been dual timeline stories.

The reason I think not having a dual timeline plot is perfect for this story is that it really is about the healing of the people who lived with the consequences of the past. So staying solely with the present-day people and hearing about the past from letters and recollections of those who lived during that time felt more authentic and real.

This is not an intense read, but it is a compelling read. It would be a good vacation read as I found it relaxing.

The characters are wonderful. The family dynamic is an interesting part of the story.

The writing is really good. The story flows really well. It's such a smooth read that I would read much more than I realized.

If you are looking for a book about family, how the past shapes the future, and moving forward then you definitely should get Return to Valetto by Dominic Smith.

My review is published at Girl Who Reads - https://www.girl-who-reads.com/2023/06/return-to-valetto-by-dominic-smith.html

Special thanks to Farrar Strauss and Giroux and NetGalley for the ARC of this book.

Return to Valetto (a town of 10 people) in Italy is a story of love, loss, and hope.

The author did a great job with writing about family and secrets held within this dying village. It's intelligent and at times humorous. I gave it 3 stars only because it's not really my favorite genre but I'd recommend it to people who like family saga and history.

Beautiful book. It tells the story of a widow, middle aged man that’s fascinated by the history of abandonment. He is a history professor whose maternal family owns a villa in a rundown city in Valetto, Italy, a fictional town that was partially destroyed by an earthquake many years ago. When he returns to the village for his grandmother’s birthday (she’s turning 100, no less) he uncovers a family secret that his mother and aunts have been hiding for decades. He’s determined to do something about it. So he gets in touch with an old man, a fascism sympathizer, in the seek of justice and reparation. I’m a fan of Dominic Smith’s books. He is a skilled writer that always has good stories to write about. This one didn’t disappoint. The characters are very well rounded and the descriptions of the life in the town (and the food!) are beautiful. I just wonder how much of the story itself I’m going to be able to remember in the future. But it was a great read.

I guess this book could be classified as an historical romance. There is certainly a lot of history and there is a romance although the two characters involved never became substantial enough for me to be affected by it.

Events take place in a small town called Valetto, now only occupied by ten citizens, one of whom is celebrating her 100th birthday with a big celebration. One unwelcome guest, Elisa Tomassi, brings back the horrors of the war and the secrets of the Resistance movement in the town. It is an interesting account of the way things were, but I felt the author succumbed to his own pleasure in writing lengthy descriptive passages. I was overwhelmed with words.

There was a good story in there though trying to get out and I enjoyed that. Three stars for me.

I loved The Last Painting of Sara de Vos and even as I requested Return to Valetto from NetGalley, I wondered if the author could come close to recreating that same magic. The answer is yes. This novel tells the story of historian Hugh Fisher heading to a tiny Italian village where his aging aunts still live. This is six years after his wife has died and his daughter Susan is afraid that going to Valetto is just another opportunity to wallow in sadness and never be happy again. Hugh's mother has just died and left him an old stone cottage in Valetto but he finds it occupied by Elsa Tomassi who says that it was promised to her family. There are secrets, betrayals, and wrongs that need to be righted, but the writing was never overly melodramatic, just Smith's lovely prose.

"We want history to be a unified narrative, a casual, linear plot that cantilevers across the centuries, but I’ve always pictured it like a filigree of a wrought-iron gate, our unaccountable lives twisting and swooping against a few vertical lines."

Thank you to Farrar, Straus, and Giroux and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book. This book will be published on June 13, 2023.

A delightful read! I enjoyed this beautifully written novel set in the fictional Italian town of Valetto. The Umbrian setting is lovely, the characters are rich and fully developed, the pacing is good. This is a story filled with nostalgia, memory, secrets and grief. While abandonment is a prominent theme of the novel, there is also a strong sense of community and connection that root the entire story beautifully. Everything ties up a bit neatly in the end, but it works – and it makes for a very satisfying finish. A perfect summer novel.

Thank you to Farrar, Strauss and Giroux and to NetGalley for providing an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. The book will be published on June 13, 2023.

4 stars.

I would like to thank Farrar, Straus and Giroux as well as Net Galley for the opportunity to read this book as an ARC. There are towns in Italy that are dying, or dead. Once such town is Civita di Bagnoregio. It is north of Rome, near Orvietto, and is nearly abandoned. It is one of the inspirations for the town of Valetto( a fictional town) in Umbria, that is inhabited full time by 10 people. It is to this town that Hugh Fisher, historian, returns to each year to visit his family. His Grandmother, and three aunts still live there. This year , his Grandmother will turn 100. Hugh is a widower. His wife and his mother died within months of each other several years ago. His daughter is grown and going to school in England.His family lives in a villa with a guest house( cottage ) in back. The cottage belonged to Hugh's mother and is now his. Hugh is anticipating a quiet time with his family while he works on a book. This plan is upended when a woman, Elisa Tomassi, appears and says that her family owns the cottage and she intends to live there. This is a multilayered book. There are many stories being told at once. Hugh's grandfather, Aldo, disappeared before the end of World War 2. He, like most of the village, were partisans and opposed the fascist regime. He and his wife took in children from the northern part of Italy ( which was being heavily shelled) and operated as part of the resistance. Elisa claims that Aldo hid out with her family until his death, and he wanted her family to have the cottage as thanks for sheltering him.I do not want to give away any spoilers, but I will say that this book is complex in its scope. It one sense, it is a story of the war, and how the townspeople were affected then , and even to today. It is also the story of family, the family we have and the family we make, and how it changes our lives. It is also the story of Hugh, who is still grieving , and who is trying to find a way to move on, even if he is not sure he wants to move on. It is funny, sad, and heart wrenching by turns. As I often say, stories of the resistance in WW2, generally do not have a lot of happy endings. This is not just a war story , however, it is a family story, and one that is well written, and well researched. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Return to Valetto by Dominic Smith, is a beautiful American-Italian epic with sweeping prose and vividly imagined characters. Arm chair travel at its finest. Even the smallest details like the meals they were eating and how they were prepared made me yearn for Italy (and polenta!).

The audiobook narrator Edoardo Ballerini was especially great with the Italian; also just so many good voices for the characters. I would absolutely listen to another audiobook narrated by him and possibly pick one just based on his attachment!

Thank you @netgalley @macmillanaudio and @FSG for the ALC!

genre: general fiction
swipe for synopsis
pub day: 6/13/23
rating: 4.5/5

Great for: 

armchair travel
White Lotus fans
readers of Amor Towles & Anthony Doerr

will you be reading this one?!

Valetto is a (ficticious) town in Italy that only has 10 residents. But this is not a sad story.
The Italian family, an aging mother and 3 aging daughters, live in the family's medieval villa.
Their grandson/nephew returns for a visit. The 4th daughter was his mother.
And that's where the story starts.
There are vivid flashbacks to World War II. The town had been flourishing before that. The family was deeply involved in the Resistance effort against Nazi Germany.
If this sounds like other historical fiction that you have read, I agree.
It reminded me of The Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian; and also of Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter (which takes place in Cinque Terre)

However, the story was not the same. This story had interesting plot twists, as well as an additional character. I don't want to give away anything about her.

Definitely worth the time. I enjoyed it and kept reading to find out what would happen. That's the sign of a good read to me. I give it 4 stars.

From it’s ethereal opening of a iron spiral staircase rising through the mist over Valatto', a villa of ten in Southern Italy that has been ravaged by earthquakes and WW2', to its bittersweet conclusion, Dominic Smith’s new novel, #ReturnToValetto embodies the root translation in Greek of the word “nostalgia', being nostos( return home) and algos( pain)". The story of Hugh Fisher, a history professor from Michigan , and his sabbatical in Italy.with a stop at the family villa in Valatto is most certainly a tale of going home and pain . Mr. Smith writes #ReturnToValatto with a glorious cinematic flair making the villa and its characters vibrate with life and made me nostalgic for the films of the past and the glorious movie palaces in which they were shown. In #ReturnToValatto Dominic Smith has created a brilliant sentimental tale which never became maudlin which is no easy task. A pleasure to read from start to finish !.

This book has a beautiful setting. That’s the most interesting thing about it. There are a lot of characters but they are merely spoken about without giving any depth. There is a lot of repetition of a few basic facts about characters without much more being explored about them. It is like visiting a very old relative who has some interesting stories but has forgotten all of the details and sometimes repeats themself because they forgot what they already said. And then they throw in some tangents about trees and bridges. I kept thinking those would come back and be important and I was mostly disappointed.

The writing is beautiful but it is like reading someone’s genealogy book but you don’t actually know any of the people. Even the interesting events are told in a really flat way.