Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #608362 in Books
• Published on: 1999-04-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

Synopsis
'This book dances with sunlight and colour, faded patinas and shifting standards, with humour and knowledge making easy companions' Mail on Sunday The monastery of San Giovanni has few treasures -- only a painting doubtfully attributed to Caravaggio. So Flavia di Stefano of Rome's Art Squad is surprised to receive a tip-off that a raid is being planned. The raid happens, but the thieves are disturbed and snatch the wrong painting, a curious icon of the Madonna, remarkable only for the affection in which it is held by the local population. Or is this what the thieves wanted all along? Does the legend of the icon's miraculous powers hold any clue? And who murdered the French dealer found in the Tiber soon afterwards? Flavia, with the help of English art dealer Jonathan Argyll, immerses herself in the intricacies and intrigues of monastic and police politics in an attempt to solve the double mystery, but the solution that awaits her is murkier and more complex than anyone could have known.

Customer Reviews

Entertaining reading
The author's obvious interest in art makes for an exciting twist on the ordinary crime story, and his beautiful descriptive use of Rome makes the perfect setting. As the plot unfolds inside a Roman monastary the pace is maintained and the twists are numerous. Based around the theft of a painting, the Roman Art Theft Squad and the valiant attempts of a British art historian to assist, weave together the modern crime with far from predictable motivations, and Rome's extensive history. For a crime novel this is enjoyable stuff, not the best of the series, but very readable - a perfect way to pass the afternoons of a British summer.

A good read, but he's written better.
This is my third Pears, and I preferred the previous two. I felt "Death and Restoration: contained some dangling ends and incongruous bits, but to go into too much detail might give away too much story. In the end everything fits, but I felt that someone had used sandpaper on my suspended disbelief.