The Battle for Rome: The Germans, the Allies, the Partisans, and the Pope, September 1943-June 1944

Expanding upon his classic account of the 1944 Ardeatine Caves massacre, Death in Rome, Katz presents a vivid, well-researched history of German-occupied Rome, from the fall of Mussolini in 1943 to the Allied Liberation 10 months later. Katz weaves several biographical histories into his narrative, devoting particular attention the experiences of five individuals: Herbert Kappler, an SS officer who began his tenure in Italy intending to save the Jews of Rome from Auschwitz but ended up presiding over the killing of 335 men and boys at the Ardeatine Caves; Peter Tompkins, the 24-year-old, bilingual OSS spy who, as the primary Allied representative in Rome, tried to make a useful network out of the brave individuals and quarreling factions residing in the Eternal City; Paolo and Elena, a partisan couple who orchestrated the most effective attack on German police troops; and Pope Pius XII, who, in Katz's telling, appears as a cold-hearted politico whose insistence on the Vatican's neutrality endangered thousands of lives in Rome. Combined with Katz's broad historical knowledge and his personal experiences living in Rome, these narratives create an engrossing portrait of a confused, tragic period of Italy's history.