Bargain Sleuth Book Reviews's Reviews > The Einstein Vendetta: Hitler, Mussolini, and a True Story of Murder

Thanks to NetGalley and Hachette Audio/Union Square & Company for the digital copy of this book; I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Content warnings provided by the reviewers on Storygraph:

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Violence
Moderate: Suicide, Murder
If you follow Bargain Sleuth Reviews, then you know that I read a lot of historical narratives, biographies, and true crime stories from time to time. The Einstein Vendetta is a WWII era real life mystery set in occupied Florence, Italy in the final years of the war. The brutal, unsolved killing of Albert Einstein’s relatives by Nazi soldiers does graze the gray area of what I typically don’t like in books: graphic violence.

I did like the blending of history with personal stories of Einstein’s cousins and overall, how life was in occupied Florence. The story is extraordinary, yet I had not heard it before. Living in Fascist-controlled Italy, those cousins, who shared the Einstein name, were targeted. I’m not going to get into the gory details of what happened, but what followed was a mystery that has lasted for 80 years.

What could have been a dry and academic approach to The Einstein Vendetta is anything but. Part WWII history lesson and part cold case mystery, I thought the presentation on audio was great. Roy McMillan was the narrator, and I really felt like I was immersed in a very good conversational history class.