A Thread of Grace

Characters

Renzo Leoni, a.k.a. Ugo Messner, Stefano Savoca, Don Gino Righetti

Lidia Segre Leoni, his widowed mother; la nonna (the grandmother)

Tranquillo Loeb, her eldest daughter’s husband

Iacopo Soncini, chief rabbi of Sant’Andrea

Mirella Casutto Soncini, his wife

Angelo, their young son

Altira, their first daughter, deceased

Rosina, their second daughter

Giacomo Tura, elderly Hebrew scribe

Claudette Blum, Belgian teenager;

Claudia Fiori, la vedova (the widow)

Albert Blum, her father

Duno Brössler, Austrian teenager, partisan

Herrmann and Frieda Brössler, his parents

Liesl and Steffi, his younger sisters

Rivka Ivanova Brössler, his paternal grandmother

Jakub Landau, organizer for the Italian CNL (Committee for National Liberation); il polacco (the Pole)

Suora (Sister) Marta, middle-aged nun

Suora Corniglia, novice, later nun; Suora Fossette (Sister Dimples)

Massimo Malcovato, her father; il maggiore (the major)

Don (male honorific) Osvaldo Tomitz, priest, Sant’Andrea

Don Leto Girotti, priest, San Mauro; il prete rosso (the red priest)

Santino Cicala, infantryman, Calabrian draftee

Catarina Dolcino, the Leonis’ landlady; Rina

Serafino Brizzolari, municipal bureaucrat, Sant’Andrea

Antonia Usodimare, proprietress, Pensione Usodimare

Tercilla Lovera, contadina (peasant woman), Santa Chiara

Pierino, Tercilla’s son; il postino (the postman)

Bettina, his sister

Battista Goletta, Fascist farmer, Valdottavo

Attilio Goletta, his cousin, Communist sharecropper

Tullio Goletta, Attilio’s son, partisan

Adele Toselli, elderly housekeeper, San Mauro rectory

Nello Toselli, her nephew, partisan

Maria Avoni, partisan; la puttana tedesca (the German whore)

Otello Rollero, partisan, interpreter for Simon Henley

Simon Henley, signalman, Special Operations executive

Werner Schramm, deserter, Oberstabsarzt (medical officer) Waffen-SS

Irmgard, his sister, deceased

Erhardt von Thadden, Gruppenführer (division commander) Waffen-SS; the Schoolmaster

Martina, his wife

Helmut Reinecke, his adjutant, Hauptsturmführer (captain), later Standartenführer (colonel, regimental commander)

Ernst Kunkel, Oberscharführer (staff sergeant), aide to von Thadden

Artur Huppenkothen, Oberstpolizei (police colonel), Gestapo

Erna, his sister