The history he teaches his students seems old-fashioned, quaint and anecdotal, and the reader may not have much confidence in his judgment. In addition to the strada vicinale there is another link between these characters. It is Mancini, the cunning and enigmatic lawyer whom most of them find reason to consult. Mancini seems to be of no particular age. His clients, with their childlike notions about justice, merely furnish him with entertainment.
Houses fall down.
They are razed. Earthquakes and enemies blitz them. After Hannibal'' does not earn the right even to this glib, routine pessimism. Mr. Unsworth himself lives in Umbria. Elsewhere, descriptions carry a heavy weight of symbolism, and this makes the writing seem inauthentic.