NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - "A powerfully imagined novel . . .
[a] profoundly moving book that engages the heights and depths of
human experience."--Los Angeles Times
It is September 8, 1943, and fourteen-year-old Claudette Blum and her
father are among the thousands of Jewish refugees scrambling over the
Alps toward Italy, where they hope to find safety now that the Italians
have broken from Germany and made a separate peace with the Allies. The
Blums will soon discover that Italy is anything but peaceful, as it
quickly becomes an open battleground for the Nazis, the Allies,
Resistance fighters, Jews in hiding, and ordinary Italian civilians
trying to survive.
Tracing the lives of a handful of fascinating characters--a charismatic
Italian Resistance leader, a priest, an Italian rabbi's family, a
disillusioned German doctor--Mary Doria Russell tells the little-known
story of the vast underground effort by Italian citizens who saved the
lives of 43,000 Jews during the final phase of World War II. A Thread
of Grace puts a human face on history.
Praise for A Thread of Grace
"An addictive page-turner . . . [Mary Doria] Russell has an
astonishing story to tell--full of action, paced like a rapid-fire
thriller, in tense, vivid scenes that move with cinematic
verve."--The Washington Post Book World
"Hauntingly beautiful, utterly unforgettable."--San Francisco
Chronicle
"Rich . . . Based on the heroism of ordinary people, [A Thread of
Grace] packs an emotional punch."--People
"[A] deeply felt and compellingly written book . . . The progress of
each character's life is marked or measured by acts of grace. . . .
Russell is a smart, passionate and imaginative writer."--Cleveland
Plain Dealer
"A feat of storytelling . . . an important book [that] needs to be
widely read."--Portland Oregonian
**
"Mary Doria Russell's fans (and aren't we all?) will rejoice to see her
new novel on the shelves. A Thread of Grace is as ambitious, beautiful,
tense, and transforming as any of us could have hoped."--Karen Joy
Fowler, author of *The Jane Austen Book Club
"A story of love and war, A Thread of Grace speaks to the resilience
and beauty of the human spirit in the midst of unimaginable horror. It
is, unquestionably, a literary triumph."--David Morrell, author of
The Brotherhood of the Rose and First Blood
