The Red House

Morris (Gateway to the Moon) blends a family mystery with the legacy of Italian Jewish displacement during WWII in this elegant mosaic. Laura, a married artist in Brooklyn, receives a voicemail from Charlie Hendricks, the detective who investigated her mother Viola’s disappearance 30 years earlier. Though Charlie says he’d “like to talk,” instead of calling him back, Laura sets off for Italy, where she was born, hoping to understand what happened to Viola in her own way. Early memories of Viola standing in front of a canvas and painting a red house, over and over, at their home in New Jersey, lead her to Tomasso, an old man who says he knew Viola. Morris mirrors flashbacks of Laura’s childhood in New Jersey with those from Viola’s own childhood at a similar age, as Jews were rounded up in WWII Italy. The expertly woven plotlines raise more questions than they answer, as someone tells Laura not to believe anything Tomasso says and she reflects on how her unsettled past drove a wedge in her marriage, but the novel culminates with Laura’s visit to her grandparents’ synagogue in Turin, which brings about a semblance of closure. The result is an unusual and satisfying tale of family secrets. Agent: Ellen Levine, Trident Media Group. (May)