Love from Venice

A Golden Summer on the Grand Canal

By: Gill Johnson

Narrated by: Rose Akroyd

A charming, funny and glamorous memoir and love-story, about a summer in 1957 in Venice, working for an aristocratic Italian family.

In the summer of 1957, anxious to impress an admirer who had moved to Paris, while rebelling against her family, Gill Johnson, aged twenty-five, gave up her comfortable job at the National Gallery in London and travelled to Venice to take up a job teaching English to an aristocratic Italian family.

Love from Venice is her vivid evocation of that summer, the last hurrah of the European Grand Tour, when the international jet set lit upon the city for their fun. Johnson describes (including through original letters written to her love in Paris) her life flitting from palazzo to Lido to palazzo, and how her feelings for him grow, while she becomes absorbed into the social whirl of the super-rich.

It is a moving and witty memoir of a young woman coming to terms with her own feelings and destiny, and learning about different aspects of love from the people she meets, all set in high-season Venice in a halcyon time. By the end, Johnson discovers if the scabrous excesses of fabulous wealth can divert the course of true love.

©2024 Gill Johnson (P)2024 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Wonderful book!

I loved the descriptive way it was written, and the historical characters woven into the story. There is a sequel there!

Love Venice, love this book

I typed Venice into the Audible search function and this was one of the books that came up. I got lucky.

I enjoyed this book a lot. I've listened to several books on the history of Venice and was looking for a more personal perspective. Gill Johnson has a writing style which is conversational and highly accessible. She creates the world of 1957 Venice, and the extraordinary people she encountered, with an engaging clarity.

Rose Akroyd does an excellent job of narration. From the very start you accept her voice as the voice of the author and this faciltates the sense of a conversation with a friend with all the warmth that goes with that experience.

If you want to be transported to a different time, place and experience, and love Venice or Italy, I'm sure you will love this book. If you are just looking for a great personal story that doesn't require the crutch of celebrity you'll find this a great read also.