"I dreamed a dream of angels. I saw them and heard them in a great and endless galactic night. I saw the lights that were these angels, flying here and there, in streaks of irresistible brilliance ... I felt love around me in this vast and seamless realm of sound and light ... And something akin to sadness swept me up and mingled my very essence with the voices who sang, because the voices were singing of me ..."
Thus begins Anne Rice's lyrical, haunting new novel, a metaphysical thriller of angels and assassins that once again summons up dark and dangerous worlds set in times past. Anne Rice takes us to other realms, this time to the world of fifteenth-century Rome, a city of domes and rooftop gardens, rising towers and crosses beneath an ever-shifting layer of clouds; familiar hills and tall pines ... of Michelangelo and Raphael, of the Holy Inquisition and of Leo X, second son of a Medici, holding forth from the papal throne ...
And into this time, into this century, Toby ODare, former government assassin, is summoned by the angel Malchiah to solve a terrible crime of poisoning and to search out the truth of a haunting by an earthbound restless spirita diabolical dybbuk.
ODare soon discovers himself in the midst of dark plots and counterplots surrounded by a darker and more dangerous threat as the veil of ecclesiastical terror closes in around him.
As he embarks on a powerful journey of atonement, ODare is reconnected with his own past, with matters light and dark, fierce and tender, with the promise of salvation and with a deeper and richer vision of love.
"Readers who enjoy Rices larger-than-life tales and elegant writing will find much to appreciate here, and the cliff-hanger ending will leave fans eager for the next installment." - Booklist
"Though the plot is surprisingly similar to that of its predecessor, Rice's fans will easily succumb to the charm of her lapidary prose and a cliffhanger ending that sets up the next book in the series." - Publishers Weekly
"This metaphysical thriller will appeal to historical fiction fans and Christian fiction readers, but it still feels a little flat and will disappoint fans of Rice's vampire fiction." - Library Journal
"Starred Review. The plot's intense; equally so are Rice's meditations, while never breaking the seamlessness of the story line, on the nature of love and evil.A bullet of a bookand an absolute bull's eye." - Kirkus
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Born Howard Allen O'Brien on October 4, 1941 in New Orleans, LA. Anne Rice chose the first name "Anne" as a child. She married Stan Rice in 1961, and their daughter Michele was born in 1966. Sadly Michele died of leukemia at the age of 5.
Anne wrote her first published novel, Interview With A Vampire, in 1973. A son, Christopher, was born in 1978 (now an established author in his own right). After living in Texas and San Francisco, Anne settled in New Orleans. However, after Stan died from a brain tumor she moved to California, where she currently lives.
She has written under three names: her own, Anne Rampling, and A. N. Roquelaure. Under her own name, she has written The Vampire Chronicles series, The Mayfair Witches, the New Tales of the Vampires series, and numerous single novels...
... Full Biography
Author Interview
Link to Anne Rice's Website
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