The Italian Party by Christina Lynch is a delicious and sharply funny audiobook about "innocent" Americans abroad in 1950s Siena.
Newly married, Scottie and Michael are seduced by Tuscany's famous beauty. But the secrets they are keeping from each other force them beneath the splendid surface to a more complex view of ltaly, America and each other.
When Scottie's Italian teacher—a teenager with secrets of his own—disappears, her search for him leads her to discover other, darker truths about herself, her husband and her country. Michael's dedication to saving the world from communism crumbles as he begins to see that he is a pawn in a much different game. Driven apart by lies, Michael and Scottie must find their way through a maze of history, memory, hate and love to a new kind of complicated truth.
Half glamorous fun, half an examination of America's role in the world, and filled with sun-dappled pasta lunches, prosecco, charming spies and horse racing, The Italian Party is a smart pleasure to listen to.
Praise for The Italian Party:
"Tremendous fun! Wives with big secrets, husbands with bigger ones, swirling around a 1950s Siena teeming with seduction and spycraft." —Chris Pavone, New York Times bestselling author of The Travelers and The Expats
"The story plays like a confectionary Hollywood romance with some deeper notes reminiscent of John le Carré and Henry James. Scottie is a resilient main character who might have been played by Grace Kelly or Audrey Hepburn in a 1950s movie adaptation of this entertainingly subversive take on that seemingly innocent period." - Publishers Weekly
"Set in Siena in 1956, this debut novel is a spy thriller, comedy of manners, and valentine to Italy, spiked with forbidden sex and political skulduggery [...] The ending is unexpected, with the author displaying a sophisticated, nuanced view of love and marriage that feels very modern. Or maybe it's just Italian." — Kirkus Reviews
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
March 20, 2018 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9781427294074
- File size: 303045 KB
- Duration: 10:31:20
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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November 20, 2017
In Lynch’s perceptive debut, set in 1956, Michael and Scottie Messina are a glamorous young American couple who have arrived in Siena, Italy, where the former is to open a Ford tractor agency. But this is just a cover story; unknown to Scottie, Michael is a CIA agent charged with ensuring that the city’s next mayor will not be a Communist. Michael and Scottie also have other secrets: Michael is a closeted gay man who has come to Italy to be with Duncan, his lover from Yale, who has something he is hiding from Michael. And Scottie is pregnant and has yet to get up the nerve to tell her husband, for reasons that include yet another secret. Michael is soon involved in espionage capers, while Scottie becomes embroiled in the search for a missing local youth she befriended. The secrets come out just as Ambassador Clare Booth Luce arrives in Siena for a visit. The story plays like a confectionary Hollywood romance with some deeper notes reminiscent of John le Carré and Henry James. Scottie is a resilient main character who might have been played by Grace Kelly or Audrey Hepburn in a 1950s movie adaptation of this entertainingly subversive take on that seemingly innocent period. Agent: Claudia Cross, Folio Literary Management. -
Narrator Edoardo Ballerini's appealing voice and flawless Italian pronunciation make Lynch's entertaining first novel a likely hit. It is 1956, and American newlyweds Michael and Scottie arrive in Siena--ostensibly for Michael's new job as a Ford tractor salesman. But Michael is, in fact, a CIA operative tasked with ensuring that communists are defeated in local elections. A colorful array of eccentrics populates the story: the superstitious crone, the crooked politician, and a spunky adolescent named Robertino, who knows everyone's business. When Robertino, Scottie's ersatz Italian teacher, suddenly goes missing, Scottie decides to investigate, starting a dangerous chain of events that leads to a surprising conclusion. D.G.P. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
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