Dominic Smith's novel Return to Valetto is narrated by Hugh Fisher, an author and historian. In the book's opening chapter we learn Hugh's wife died of cancer six years prior, and his mother followed not long afterwards; he's been unable to move on with his life, still mourning these losses. While on a lecture tour in Italy he decides to spend time in his mother's birthplace, Valetto, a tiny village situated on a crumbling plateau in the country's central region. Among the town's 10 remaining residents are his three elderly aunts and his grandmother, who is within weeks of celebrating her 100^th birthday. He plans to stay in a cottage behind their villa that he inherited from his mother, but he finds the house has recently been occupied by a squatter. Elisa Tomassi claims Hugh's grandfather (who left his wife and four daughters to join the World War II Italian resistance and was never ...