Lucia is the author's reconstruction of the life and times of one of his ancestors, Lucia Mocenigo, an 18th century, Venetian noblewoman who lived through some of the most dramatic events in the recent history of Europe. She rented her villa to lord Byron, watched Napoleon transform Italy into an imperial property, and served princesses, all while hardly ever leaving the Boot. Though Mr. Di Robilant has found other sources to flesh out this portrait of a beautiful noblewoman living through extraordinary times, Lucia's letters are the centerpiece of this work. Not only do her words flow like water, there seems no subject on which she is silent as she describes, to her sister, in great detail, her triumphs and her failures.
This is a lens through which to view the 50 or so years between 1780 and 1830, in which the French Revolution allowed for the rise of Napoleon and his many wars, his defeat and the conference at Vienna in 1814 which literally redrew the borders of most of Europe. But though the history brightens the tale, Lucia is definitely the gem, the object of interest. She is merely one woman, a woman who died almost 180 years ago, and yet she is proof that, no matter how much time has past, humanity, from all the ages, hungers for essentially the same things, love, acceptance, and success. (3/5 Stars)
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