Giuseppe

Giuseppe: A Survival Story reads like an autobiography. We are given the fictionalized firsthand account of Italy for much of the first half of the 20th century. We travel with Giuseppe from his home in Pontestura to his service in the military, first in Greece, then akin to a conscripted slave, in Germany. We see through his eyes the rise of Fascism and the ascension of Benito Mussolini. Giuseppe conveys not an academic interpretation from a detached bias; but, rather, his are the observations of an everyday Italian concerned about living standards. ... Giuseppe: A Survival Story is a fascinating epic akin to the great works of World War II literature. The novel is a reminder of the terrible costs of war.

— PRIMO, PRIMO Magazine

Many historical fiction authors write about real people, combining facts with imagined feelings. San Giorgio has done exactly this – and done it so magnificently, that it reads like a genuine memoir.

— Helen Johnson, Historical Novel Society

Much of the history we in the English speaking world have of World War II focuses on the campaigns in Russia, Messerschmitts dogfighting with Spitfires over London, and the massive island campaigns in the Pacific between the Japanese and Americans. But one of the two founding members of the Axis Powers, Italy, receives much less attention, as its involvement does not neatly fit into the narrative of the world war, having begun operations as a fascist state in the 1920s and leaving the war early in 1943. The post-armistice period, however, was arguably the most difficult for Italy, as the civil war that broke out between the fascists, communists, and ordinary people took a tremendous toll on the social fabric of Italian families, and over 1 million men who were forcibly taken to Germany to work in their war factories. Piero San Giorgio, grandson of one of these men, joins us tonight to tell his story.

— Myth of the 20th Century, BitChute