The Savage Garden by Mark Mills

Synopsis

A haunting tale of murder, love and innocence lost set in post-war Tuscany . Behind a villa in the heart of Tuscany lies a Renaissance garden of enchanting beauty. Its grottoes, pagan statues and classical inscriptions seem to have a secret life of their own - and a secret message, too, for those with eyes to read it.

Young scholar Adam Strickland is just such a person. Arriving in 1958, he finds the Docci family, their house and the unique garden as seductive as each other. But post-War Italy is still a strange, even dangerous place, and the Doccis have some dark skeletons hidden away which Adam finds himself compelled to investigate. Before this mysterious and beautiful summer ends, Adam will uncover two stories of love, revenge and murder, separated by 400 years... but is another tragedy about to be added to the villa's cursed past?

A promising book set in Italy, but having read it I can say that very little of that promise was fulfilled. It seemed to take so long to get going, more than a hundred pages in nothing much had happened. I feel I should take some of the responsibility, I should have been intrigued by the mysterious Renaissance garden that Adam spends a lot of time on. He decoded the many secrets hidden in the garden's layout and statuary. This is the sort of thing I usually enjoy, but it just didn't fire my imagination, I feel this is more a lack in me than the author.

The last third of the book was completely different, the intrigue and mystery, the revealing of the Doccis dark family secret finally held my attention, though disappointingly, I felt the ending was weak, though I can't say why without revealing plot lines.