In post-WWII Italy, an American uncovers a Vatican scandal in a "thriller with deeply serious historical undertones" by a National Book Award winner (Alan Cheuse, NPR, All Things Considered).
David Warburg, newly minted director of the US War Refugee Board, arrives in Rome at war's end, determined to bring aid to the destitute European Jews streaming into the city. Marguerite d'Erasmo, a French-Italian Red Cross worker with a shadowed past, is initially Warburg's guidewhile a charismatic young American Catholic priest, Monsignor Kevin Deane, seems equally committed to aiding Italian Jews.
But the city is a labyrinth of desperate fugitives: runaway Nazis, Jewish resisters, and criminal Church figures. Marguerite, caught between justice and revenge, is forced to play a double game. At the center of the maze, Warburg discovers one of history's great scandals: the Vatican ratline, a clandestine escape route maintained by Church officials and providing scores of Nazi war criminals with secret passage to South America.
"A high-stakes battle between good and evil [and] a plot full of twists and turns." The Boston Globe
"A suspenseful historical drama set in Rome at the end of WWII and centering on Vatican complicity in the flight of Nazi fugitives to Argentina." Publishers Weekly
"Recommend this utterly engaging thriller to fans of Joseph Kanon's The Good German and James R. Benn's Death's Door." Booklist, starred review