Domenic's War: A Story of the Battle of Monte Cassino

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

Despite its singular title, Domenic’s War is actually about two male
adolescents caught up in events of the Italian Campaign during World War
II. Domenic Luppino, 13, lives with his family on their farm in the Liri
Valley, 20 kilometres north of Monte Cassino, a strategic German
stronghold blocking the Allies’ advance on Rome. Initially,
Domenic’s personal connection to the war is his daily hike to secretly
deliver food to two escaped allied airmen hidden in an abandoned mill.
After German troops commandeer the Luppino home as an HQ and billet,
Domenic must sneak supplies to his father and older brother who, to
avoid forced labour, have fled to the hills with the airmen.

Antonio, 15, the sole survivor of an Allied artillery strike on his
family’s home in Monte Cassino, has a more intense war experience as
he becomes immersed in the Battle of Monte Cassino, which raged between
January 4 and May 19, 1944. Having sought refuge with other civilians in
the Benedictine monastery, Antonio becomes a refugee after Allied bombs
flatten the monastery. Conscripted as a muleteer to resupply German
troops via dangerous nightly treks, Antonio, with his mule, strays into
another mule train belonging to East Indian troops during confusion
caused by Allied shelling, and he willingly switches sides. Tenuously
linking the two young teens is Adriana, Antonio’s schoolmate and
romantic interest, who, as a refugee, passes through Domenic’s farm.

Possibly constrained by the historical fiction genre, Parkinson’s
writing lacks the energy found in his earlier sea-based novels,
Storm-Blast (2003) and Sea Chase (2004). Recommended with reservations.