The Army of Lost Rivers

Sgorlon's novel is based on the encounter between the Friulans and the Cossacks in this little-known tragedy of World War II. In the summer of 1944 a Cossack army complete with its dependents - women, children, and the aged, along with horses, camels, tents, and icons - descended on Friuli. In exchange for supporting the Germans against the Red Army, the Germans had promised them this region in mountainous, northeastern Italy as a new homeland, and then the Germans abandoned both the invading Cossacks and the native Friulans to their terrible fates. Against this alpine backdrop, beneath the nightly bombing flights of the Flying Fortresses and between the retreating Germans and the advancing Americans, townspeople, partisans and Cossacks are caught in an ominous web. Carlo Sgorlon has also published an English translation of his novel, "The Wooden Throne," with Italica Press. Winner of the Premio Strega in 1985.