A passionate affair set in Venice between a Roman princess searching for undervalued paintings and a mysterious tour guide. Art shenanigans become unavoidable, but the guide's true identity is the mystery that drives the story.
Their passion will last three days, long enough to be exposed to unscrupulous art dealers and scammers passing off worthless paintings as part of a famous collection. She goes to cosmopolitan parties given by Venetian social and art glitterati. Mr Silvera, a guide whose erudition and distinction sharply contrast with his beat-up suitcase and stain-spotted raincoat, drags his shabby tourists from monument to monument.
Around them are the canals and lagoons of Venice, a city which becomes a character in the novel in its own right.
Written with elegance and wit, this is an atypical, sophisticated novel of love, crime and social satire worthy of Fellini's Dolce Vita or Sorrentino's The Great Beauty.
The novel does have a mystery at its heart – and it concerns the identity of the principal character, apparently a tour guide, but clearly something else as well.
