The Wedding Officer
Anthony Capella. Bantam Books, $22 (423pp) ISBN 978-0-553-80547-5
London-based culinarian Capella (Food of Love) returns with the WWII-era story of Livia Pertini, a beautiful young widow who leaves her family's destitute country osteria to try to find work in Naples. There, English Capt, James Gould has been assigned the task of discouraging British soldiers from marrying Italian women, many of whom have turned to prostitution in order to survive. At first Gould is a stickler for the rules, closing down restaurants and denying couples permission to marry. But when Angelo, the maitre d' at restaurant Zi'Teresa, tricks him into hiring Livia as the officers' cook, things loosen up considerably. Capella celebrates war-torn pleasures of the flesh with a winning in-the-moment lightness.
Details
Reviewed on: 04/30/2007
Genre: Fiction
Hardcover - 978-1-4074-0473-8
Hardcover - 342 pages - 978-0-316-73094-5
Hardcover - 542 pages - 978-1-58547-989-4
Mass Market Paperbound - 560 pages - 978-0-553-59145-3
Open Ebook - 332 pages - 978-0-553-90370-6
Paperback - 342 pages - 978-0-316-73095-2
Paperback - 448 pages - 978-0-553-38463-5