In 1859, during the Battle of Solferino, a young lieutenant saves the life of Emperor Franz Joseph I. of Austria, and so begins the story of the family Trotta, which is paralleled to the decline and fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The focus lies mostly on the son and grandson of the Hero of Solferino, who dies relatively early, although his legacy looms over their lives in the same way that the omnipresence of the emperor looms over the lives of his subjects. The book […]