Here’s another one of those beautiful books I cried over, so if you don’t want to read about a book that takes your heart apart several times, and tries to mend it, a book about love and death, food, music, poetry and Shakespeare, you might as well skip my comments about Mary Bly’s Lizzie & Dante.

At 32, Lizzie Delford is a Shakespeare professor who grew up in foster care, but found her best friend, Grey Thuston, there. She could be considered lucky that she’s heading to Elba for a month with Grey, a bestselling horror novelist, and his lover, Rohan Das, a movie star. Because Rohan is directing a new film version of “Romeo and Juliet”, Lizzie is along as a consultant. But, Lizzie has Stage Three cancer, and she sees this as her last fling before she dies.

Because Rohan is swarmed with women and wealthy people from yachts wherever he goes, Lizzie sneaks off to the public beach where she meets a scruffy dog with a collar that says, “Lulu”. She’s not on Elba to meet Italian men, so she’s not happy when Lulu’s equally scruffy owner shows up. But, he recommends a lunch restaurant to her. After he tells her he has a twelve-year-old daughter, Etta, Dante invites her to his restaurant where he’s chef/owner, saying he’ll make a reservation for Lizzie and friends.

As it turns out, Rohan’s main reason to come to Elba was to eat at Principe Blu, a two-star restaurant owned by Nicola Moretti. That’s the reason all the yachts come to Elba, because the owners hope to eat there. Moretti’s restaurant in New York City is so popular, it’s hard to get a reservation. Rohan is hoping to meet the chef on Elba.

Who knew that Nicola Moretti’s real name is Dante? Rohan is in as much awe as Dante’s daughter, Etta, when she plunks herself down at the table and introduces herself to the trio. And, Dante, who never allows substitutions of his menu, and won’t fix hamburgers for Americans, treats Lizzie as family and makes a hamburger.

Etta, who needs a mother, falls in love with Lizzie. As Lizzie falls in love with Etta and her father, how does she tell these two people that she has cancer and she’s dying? Time after time, she thinks now is the time, only to back away because of the joy and love she’s experiencing.

Lizzie & Dante is a beautiful book filled with joy despite the forecast for the future. Should you give up love and life because you’re dying? Or should you enjoy every moment of love that life offers? A poet makes a few suggestions to Lizzie, but it’s the man she loves who has poetry in his heart who truly offers answers.

Here’s the third book teaser for Lizzie & Dante, with Bly’s family featured. (There are two earlier teasers, but this is my favorite.)

If you’re interested, I learned quite a lot from a newspaper article by Laurie Hertzel in the Star Tribune, http://strib.mn/3i8cbsO. It’s called, “Bookmark: Mary Bly’s new novel – her first under her own name – is laced with Minnesota poetry”.

Mary Bly is chair of the English department at Fordham University. She’s the daughter of Robert Bly, the poet, and short story writer Carol Bly. I read her memoir, Paris in Love: A Memoir, about the year her family moved to Paris after the death of her mother to cancer and Bly’s own diagnosis of cancer. She’s a bestselling historical romance writer under the name Eloisa James. Bly is married to a language professor, an Italian. It doesn’t hurt to know any of that information when reading Lizzie & Dante. And, it turns out that Bly’s family vacationed on Elba as part of their summers spent in Italy.

Mary Bly’s website is https://www.eloisajames.com/

Lizzie & Dante by Mary Bly. The Dial Press, 2021. ISBN 9780593134825 (hardcover), 302p.

FTC Full Disclosure – Library book (although I went ahead and bought a copy for myself after reading this one)