Sarah Dunant

A Novel

The Birth of Venus

In the Company of the Courtesan

Sacred hearts

1527. While the Papal city of Rome burns, two of her most interesting and wily citizens slip away. Though almost as damaged as their beloved city, Fiammetta Bianchini and Bucino Teodoldi - a fabulous courtesan and her dwarf companion - are already planning their future. They head for the shimmering beauty of Venice, a honey pot of wealth and trade where they start to rebuild their business. As a partnership they are invincible: Bucino, clever with a sharp eye and a wicked tongue and Fiammetta, beautiful and shrewd, trained from birth to charm, entertain and satisfy men who have the money to support her. Venice, however, is a city which holds its own temptations...

Transgressions

Roy Porter

This is an incisive and intelligent collection of new writing on the anxieties born from the imminent arrival of the next century, that includes contributions from Susie Orbach, Linda Grant and Oscar Moore.

The Age of Anxiety

Året er 1492, og Alessandra er knap 15 år, da hendes far, en velstående klædehandler, tager en maler med hjem fra Nordeuropa. Maleren skal udsmykke væggene i kapellet i familiens florentinske palazzo. Som barn af renæssancen, fremmelig og med talent for at tegne, beruses Alessandra af malerens evner. Hun bliver via maleren trukket ind i sin fødeby Firenze, hvor den nye tankefrihed lever side om side med de gamle, kødelige laster. Hun opdager, at ondskaben hærger i byens gader og er vidne til, hvordan den fundamentalistiske munk Savonarola kommer til magten. Alessandra og Firenze er fanget mellem mediciernes stat med dens luksus, lærdom og blændende kunst og Savonarolas trusler om helvede og den vold, hans tilhængere udøver. Og midt i det hele har maleren - og hans kunst - en stærk og voksende erotisk tiltrækning på Alessandra. Venus' fødsel er en tour de force, begået af en af Englands mest fascinerende spændingsforfattere. Romanen giver et levende billede af Firenzes historie i den mest dramatiske periode og er med Alessandras lidenskabelige stemme en fængslende beretning om kærlighed, kunst, religion og magt. En bemærkelsesværdig heltinde med samme smittende livskraft som hendes elskede by.

Kærlighed og død i Firenze

Venus' fødsel

Danzando con la fortuna. I Borgia

Turning fifteen in Renaissance Florence, Alessandra Cecchi becomes intoxicated with the works of a young painter whom her father has brought to the city to decorate the family's Florentine palazzo.

The Political Correctness Debate

The War of the Words

Alessandra is not quite fifteen when her prosperous merchant father brings a young painter back with him from Holland to adorn the walls of the new family chapel. She is fascinated by his talents and envious of his abilities and opportunities to paint to the glory of God. Soon her love of art and her lively independence are luring her into closer involvement with all sorts of taboo areas of life. On excursions into the streets of night-time Florence she observes a terrible evil stalking the city and witnesses the rise of the fiery young priest, Savanarola, who has set out to rid the city of vice, richness, even art itself. Alessandra must make crucial decisions about the shape of her adult life, as Florence itself must choose between the old ways of the luxury-loving Medicis and the asceticism of Savanorola. And through it all, there is the painter, whose love will change everything.

In Birth Marks, private investigator Hannah Wolfe gets a case worthy of the great detective novels she so admires. At first glance, this one doesn't fit the bill: she's asked to find a missing ballet dancer, Carolyn Hamilton. When Carolyn's body is fished out of the Thames, stones in her pockets and an eight-month-old fetus in her belly, the police think it's a no-brainer: Single pregnant woman can't face her impending responsibilities, takes a leap off a bridge. But Hannah can't shake the suspicion that something else is going on. Hannah's investigation takes her from the London dance world to the upper echelons of Parisian society in search of the unborn child's father. But his explanation only raises more questions, and for Hannah the case grows more treacherous, fueling her own ambivalent feelings about relationships and motherhood.

Sarah Dunant

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