Liberation of this novel's title refers to several points of liberation, most specifically the liberation of the island of Elba by Allied forces in 1944. As she did in her previous novel,
Tourmaline, Joanna Scott returns to Elba, this time placing Adriana Nardi at the center of her story. As the novel opens, she's a 10-year old girl hiding in a kitchen cabinet while African soldiers under French command move through the island in pursuit of the occupying Germans. The Elbans, though, are as afraid of the Africans as they were of the Germans and for good reason. At the backdrop of atrocities committed by the Africans, Senegalese soldier Amdu Diop finds himself wounded while trying to run away from the war, and he ends up at La Chiatta, the estate of Adriana's family. Those few days of her childhood are remembered by Adriana 60 years later as she suffers a life-threatening medical emergency on a train to Manhattan. Those days with Amdu in 1944 were her days of liberation, moving from a girl's perspective into a more mature and realistic view of a world.
Liberation has received mostly positive reviews with BookLoons.com saying, "Joanna Scott gives us another lyrical and engrossing story in
Liberation, one that deals with innocents in wartime, first love, and the misunderstandings that individuals carry into relationships through personal prejudice and cultural divides."
