Daughter of Ashes by Ilaria Tuti

Set in the idyllic mountains of Northern Italy, the latest volume in Ilaria Tuti’s gripping series is a tour de force, a poignant and irresistible story about the relentless pull of the past on the present.

Superintendent Teresa Battaglia, a trail-blazing criminal detective on the Italian police force, is on sick leave, recovering from her recent brush with death in pursuit of a killer. But none of her colleagues, not even her partner, know that her Alzheimer’s is getting worse, and that Teresa is unsure she will ever return to work.

Teresa’s plans for retirement are shelved, however, when she is urgently summoned to meet with menacing serial killer Giacomo Mainardi. Refusing to speak with anyone but Teresa, whose investigative work twenty-seven years prior landed him in maximum security prison, Mainardi has disconcerting news: somebody is after him, and only Teresa holds the key to keeping everyone, including herself, safe. To solve the case, Teresa must come face to face with a history she thought she’d buried, back to when Giacomo first began to kill, and Teresa—newly pregnant and married to an abusive man—did everything she could to catch him.

Story Locale: Italy

Series Overview: Now in her mid-60s, Superintendent Teresa Battaglia has fought hard for her rank and still struggles to gain respect in the male-dominated police force she serves on in Northern Italy as she investigates brutal crimes in rural areas.

Ilaria Tuti lives in Gemona del Friuli, in the province of Udine. She has a degree in economics and has always had a passion for painting and nature. She has won Italy’s National Women’s Literary Prize and was nominated for the Sue Grafton Memorial Award. She is the author of two other novels in the Teresa Battaglia series, Flowers over the Inferno and The Sleeping Nymph.


Ekin Oklap was born in Turkey, grew up in Italy, and currently lives in London. She translates from Turkish and Italian. As a translator, she has been shortlisted for the International Booker Prize and the John Florio Prize.

Author Residence: Italy

Author Hometown: Gemona del Fruili, Italy