As the laws grew progressively more outrageous, some chose to leave the country, but most remained. Even as the danger signs accumulated, they could not believe that what was happening in Germany and Poland would ever happen in Italy. Like the metaphorical frog being boiled alive in a slowly heating pot of water, most Italian Jews adapted to the harsh new realities and simply went on with their lives. For families like Lorenzo’s, families who had lived in Italy for centuries, where else would they go?
In 1943, with the German occupation of northern and central Italy, these families found themselves trapped. As the German and Italian SS hunted them down, Jews scrambled to hide or escape. Some made it safely over the mountains to Switzerland. Some were taken in by nuns or priests and were sheltered in monasteries or convents. Some hid in the homes of sympathetic friends or neighbors.
But too many were arrested and deported like Lorenzo’s family, sent by train to destinations north. Most believed they were headed to labor camps; few could have imagined their journeys would end in Polish crematoriums.
In Venice, disaster struck with such suddenness that they were surprised in their beds. In early December 1943, as air raid sirens wailed to drown out any cries, authorities rounded up close to a hundred Jews. Imprisoned temporarily in a school that had been transformed into a detention center, they went without food for days, until pitying neighbors tossed food through the windows. Half-starved, marched to the waiting train that would transport them out of the city, the detainees must still have believed they would survive, as many of them wrote reassuring letters home to their friends in Venice.
Their journey to Auschwitz would have brought them through the transit camp at Risiera di San Sabba, on the outskirts of Trieste. Originally built as a rice-husking factory, Risiera di San Sabba was converted into the only extermination camp on Italian soil. By the spring of 1944, it was furnished with its own crematorium, the final destination for thousands of executed political prisoners, Resistance fighters, and Jews. The noise of the executions, and sometimes the screams from the oven itself, were said to be so disturbing that music was played to drown out the sounds.
In this brutal historical landscape, it is easy to identify villains, from the politicians who campaigned for anti-Semitic laws, to the fascist police who willingly arrested and deported their fellow Italians, to the informants who betrayed their neighbors and colleagues. But it is just as easy to find heroes: Professor Giuseppe Jona, who, when ordered to turn over the names of his fellow Jews in Venice, instead destroyed the lists and committed suicide; the thousands of Resistance fighters, many of whom died at the hands of torturers in San Sabba; the sympathetic carabinieri, police officials who refused to round up local Jews and even assisted in their concealment; and the countless nuns, priests, and everyday Italians who fed, clothed, and sheltered strangers who were in desperate need.
Like the Balbonis, some of these unsung heroes paid for their deeds with their lives.
These are the people I wanted to honor in Playing with Fire, these ordinary men and women whose quiet acts of humanity and sacrifice give us all hope. Even in the darkest of times, there will always be a Laura to light the way.
For Further Reading
Susan Zuccotti, The Italians and the Holocaust. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1996.
Renzo De Felice, The Jews in Fascist Italy. New York: Enigma Books, 2001.
“The Holocaust in Italy.” United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. ushmm.org/learn/mapping-initiatives/geographies-of-the-holocaust/the-holocaust-in-italy
“Risiera di San Sabba.” Museum website: http://www.risierasansabba.it/english/
Acknowledgments
The power of music to inspire and to change lives, even across the centuries, is at the heart of Playing with Fire. I’m grateful to all the people who brought the gift of music into my life: my parents, who knew I would someday thank them for all those long and tedious hours of practice on the piano and violin; my music teachers, who patiently endured all my sour notes; and my Maine jam session buddies, with whom I’ve shared many a raucous night trading tunes. Musicians are the warmest, most generous people in the world, and I feel blessed to be part of their circle. In particular I thank Janet Ciano, who lovingly inspired a whole generation of string players; Chuck Markowitz, who shares my love of just fooling around on fiddles; and Heidi Karod, for being the very first to play Incendio.
I’m grateful for the steadfast support from my literary agent, Meg Ruley, my editors Linda Marrow (Ballantine) and Sarah Adams (Transworld UK), and a publishing team that spans both sides of The Pond: Libby McGuire, Sharon Propson, Gina Centrello, Kim Hovey, Larry Finlay, and Alison Barrow. You are all a joy to work with!
Most of all, I thank my husband, Jacob, who has stood beside me through every high and low of my career. It’s a tough job being a writer’s spouse, and nobody does it better.
By Tess Gerritsen
RIZZOLI & ISLES NOVELS
The Surgeon
The Apprentice
The Sinner
Body Double
Vanish
The Mephisto Club
The Keepsake
Ice Cold
The Silent Girl
Rizzoli & Isles: Last to Die
Rizzoli & Isles: Die Again
OTHER NOVELS
Girl Missing
Harvest
Life Support
Bloodstream
Gravity
The Bone Garden
Playing with Fire
About the Author
New York Times bestselling author TESS GERRITSEN earned international acclaim for her first novel of suspense, Harvest. She introduced Detective Jane Rizzoli in The Surgeon (2001) and Dr. Maura Isles in The Apprentice (2002) and has gone on to write numerous other titles in the celebrated Rizzoli & Isles series, most recently The Mephisto Club, The Keepsake, Ice Cold, The Silent Girl, Last to Die, and Die Again. Her latest novel is the standalone thriller Playing with Fire. A physician, Tess Gerritsen lives in Maine.
tessgerritsen.com
Facebook.com/TessGerritsen
@tessgerritsen
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