Beneath a Scarlet Sky

by Mark Sullivan

This fiction book is based on a real person.

It is the story of a young Italian man, Pino Lella during WWII.  He is only 17.  As Germany and Italy are at war with the rest of Europe Pino's parents send first his brother away and then Pino reluctantly goes too.  Their parents want them to be safe and not recruited to fight.   Prior to going Pino meets a girl on the street and falls for her.  He invites her to join him at a movie but she stands him up.  While Pino and his brother are at the movie a bomb drops on the building.  Pino sustains a facial cut, his brother is okay but many people in the theatre and surrounding streets are killed or injured.

The boys go to a church school high in the mountains.  When Pino arrives the head Priest gets Pino climbing the surrounding mountains to get in shape and to learn different routes.  The Priest doesn't explain his reason at first but eventually tells Pino that he will be leading Jews out of Italy to safety in Switzerland.  Pino is very happy to be contributing to the war in this way.

While Pino is up in the mountains he meet a local boy who aspires to a racing car driver.  He agrees to teach Pino to drive fast if Pino will teach him how to ski.

Then one day Pino is summoned back to Milan and his parents tell him they want him to enlist in the Nazi Army, in a Technical Group.  They think that in this way he won't go to the front and be killed.  They also encourage him to be a spy back to the allies.  He is given a general admin role but one day he finds a nazi soldier struggling with a car.  Pino is able to fix the problem and the German Official, one of the senior Nazis in Italy, decides to take him on as his driver.  This is a great opportunity for Pino as he is able to report on a lot, but he also observes firsthand the cruelty of his boss and the German army.  He is shocked to find that the maid for the mistress of his boss is the girl he was smitten with.  They eventually develop a relationship.

As the story goes on Pino saves the life of his boss by dodging a strafing plane.  His boss is very impressed and grateful.  Pino is torn, he doesn't know why he saved the man when he really hates him for all the atrocities he is committing on Jews and on Italians (stealing all the food from farms to feed German troops). 

As the Germans are losing the war Pino eventually is ordered to arrest his boss.  He is delighted to do so.  But he later learns that by arresting the man his girlfriend and the German's mistress were captured and hung.  He is distraught by this.  Ironically he later has to deliver his former boss to safety in Switzerland.  The boss had made some friends by doing favours and is "pardoned" by the Allies.  This really upsets him also.  Later Pino is able to move to America and has a successful life.

I really enjoyed the book.  It gave a very detailed description of what life was like in Italy at that time and what people experienced and also what they did to fight the Nazis and the fascists.