“The ultimate fantasy.”—E!

“Falling in love with an Italian chef who loves you. Lots of sweet love-making. A 12-year-old who wants a mother desperately. Talk of Shakespeare, James Wright and Romeo and Juliet. A group of people who create a family. Also food and wine and the heat of the Italian sun. All of this comes together in Mary Bly’s tender [and] delightful ‘Lizzie & Dante.”—St. Paul Pioneer Press

“This is the sweeping magnificent romance of the summer! This book channels Love Story and Me Before You. Set in glorious Italy, Lizzie & Dante is an unforgettable gem!”—Frolic

“I so enjoyed Lizzie and Dante—funny, joyful, bittersweet, full of beautiful lines about what it means to be alive, with a perfect ending. It brought me to tears! It’s the ultimate summer read.”—#1 New York Times bestselling author Christina Baker Kline

“Mary Bly has written a glorious novel about the power of love. You will bask under Bly’s Italian sun with relish and root for Lizzie, who finds happiness before it’s too late. Brava!”—Adriana Trigiani, author of Lucia, Lucia

“Prepare to be swept away on an Italian holiday—one that sizzles with romance, intrigue, and mouthwatering cuisine. Mary Bly captures every woman’s fantasy—to travel to a remote Italian island and fall in love. Bella!”—Lori Nelson Spielman, author of One Italian Summer

“I fell in love with Lizzie and Dante—and the whole cast of characters. And Elba. This is such a heartbreakingly beautiful story, full of smiles and tears. I could see and smell Napoleon’s little island, taste Dante’s food, and hear Lizzie sing. Wow.”—Karen White, author of Dreams of Falling

“Lizzie & Dante is a feast of a novel: for the senses, the mind, and the emotions. The story unfolds in a whirl of Italian landscape, food, passion, and philosophy. No subject is too big for this book, no detail too small. It is a joyful, escapist, wise, and satisfying story that answers the questions we didn’t even know we wanted to ask.”—Sophie Kinsella, author of The Party Crasher
*
“An emotional roller coaster of a novel that candidly explores such complicated subjects as sex and desire, love and loss, and family and friendship.”****—Booklist (starred review)***

“Fans of emotional tearjerkers, of romance, or of authors Kristin Hannah and Elin Hilderbrand will not be able to put this down.”—Library Journal (starred review)

Autorentext
Mary Bly is a New York Times bestselling author under the name Eloisa James, and chair of the English department at Fordham University. She lives with her family in New York City, but can sometimes be found in Paris or Italy. She is the mother of two and, in a particularly delicious irony for a romance writer, is married to a genuine Italian knight.

Klappentext

The insightful, audacious, and deeply romantic story of a woman whose life turns upside down after she meets an enigmatic chef on vacation in Italy--perfect for fans of Beautiful Ruins or Under the Tuscan Sun.

On the heels of a difficult break-up and a devastating diagnosis, Shakespearian scholar Lizzie Delford decides to take one last lavish vacation on Elba, the sun-kissed island off the Italian coast, with her best friend and his movie-star boyfriend. Once settled into a luxurious seaside resort, Lizzie has to make big decisions about her future, and she needs the one thing she may be running out of: time.

She leaves the yacht-owners and celebrities behind and sneaks off to the public beach, where she meets a sardonic chef named Dante, his battered dog Lily, and his wry daughter Etta, a twelve-year-old desperate for a mother. While Dante shows Lizzie the island's secrets, and Etta dazzles with her irreverent humor, Lizzie is confronted with a dilemma. Is it right to fall in love if time is short? Is it better to find a mother briefly, or to have no mother at all? And the most difficult question of all: What if falling in love inevitably leads to broken hearts?

A transporting, all-consuming story about love, courage, and Italian wine, Lizzie & Dante demands to know how far we should travel to find a future worth fighting for.

Leseprobe
Chapter One

JULY 13, 2019

Water sliced past the boat in a froth of deep blue and grey, the kind of froth that made you think about pollutants. Off in the distance, the island of Elba was a dim green mound.

Elba isn’t known for much. It produces a perfume called Acqua dell’Elba that smells of white flowers and the sea. It’s regularly visited by yachts the size of the Titanic. But mostly, it’s the island where Napoleon was exiled with a throwaway title, Emperor of Elba.

Lizzie Rose Delford was headed to Elba because of Napoleon’s whining comment, Able was I, ere I saw Elba.

It had a dark humor that worked for Lizzie. A stupid little sentence, although the English professor in her noted that “Able was I” was an aphorism and a factoid, as well as a palindrome. Symmetrical, beautiful, and meaningful in its own dark way. To Lizzie: perfect.

Not that any woman with Stage Three cancer could call herself “able.”

An arm abruptly wrapped around her shoulders. “Rohan sent me up to see if we’re about to capsize.”

The boat was pitching in a strong wind. Lizzie rubbed her head against Grey’s chest. “We’re fine.”

“Is that Elba?”

Lizzie nodded. “Should Rohan know? Would he want to come up?”

“No. He’s down in the cabin pretending to be nauseated so he can do the Times crossword in peace.” Grey drew her closer, tucked her into the crook of his arm. “Remember that time when we almost capsized on the way to Lesvos?”

Lizzie leaned against him, loving the lean strength of his body and the Georgia drawl he’d never managed to get rid of, though he complained that there was nothing more out of place than a southern man living in L.A. “I dreamed about it for years after,” she admitted.

He opened his mouth and shut it. Probably about to tell her, again, that she should confront her demons, before he thought better of it. Screw her demons.

Elba grew larger in a lumpy sort of way, and German tourists standing in the helm took numerous pictures with their cellphones. The water turned clear turquoise closer to the shore, little whitecaps glinting like sparklers.

Stores lined the harbor, and above them, smoky pink and saffron buildings sprawled on rounded hills.

“The town looks so accidental,” Lizzie said, liking the way the houses piled on top of each other and spilled down narrow streets.

“Italians don’t do city planners,” Grey said.

A half hour later, Lizzie humped her suitcase down the narrow metal stairs and got herself out of the belly of their ferry, the Moby-Dick. Once on shore, she stopped.

The pitted cement at her feet was so hot that it seemed to undulate. The air even smelled hot, like brilliant sunlight turned corporeal. Close up, the saffron buildings were cheerfully yellow and orange, and looked even more disordered.

Italians streamed by her, chattering loudly, their tickets littering the ground like confetti. Perhaps they had come over for the day, since they had no luggage.

Someone recognized Rohan. No, a whole group of someones.

He was smiling, likely telling them how much he enjoyed being an Avenger, or an ER doctor, or, since they were middle-aged, lauding the days when he pl…