The Girl with the Botticelli Eyes
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
When a madman begins using the work of Botticelli as inspiration for his gruesome tableaus, a New York museum curator is the only man who can stop him
Mike Manship is an up-and-coming curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. With a Botticelli retrospective fast approaching, Manship is poised to become the Met’s director if he can secure three final drawings from Italy. Standing in his way is Ludovico Borghini, a neo-fascist count with a fanatical devotion to his Italian heritage and a deadly obsession with the Renaissance master’s work. Between them are the three masterpieces and the alluring Isobel Cattaneo, a direct descendant of Botticelli’s greatest muse, Simonetta.
Borghini is determined to maintain possession of the drawings, and in the grips of his mania, he kidnaps Cattaneo, whom he suspects of aiding Manship. As the search for Cattaneo reaches a fever pitch, Manship discovers that Borghini is a much more twisted nemesis than he could ever have anticipated—one whose depravity reaches chilling depths.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
After a brief foray into futuristic science fiction (Sandman, Sleep, 1993), Lieberman returns to his forte of mordant, contemporary crime chillers (Shadow Dancers, etc.), this one set in the world of high art. To commemorate the 550th birthday of Botticelli, Mark Manship, curator of Renaissance painting at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is assembling a major retrospective that could catapult him into the position of museum director. In Europe to track down three drawings for the show, Manship meets the eponymous Isobel Cattaneo, a direct descendant of Botticelli's famed model and mistress, Simonetta. Meanwhile, in a parallel plot line, a neo-fascist Italian count, Ludovico Borghini, determined to preserve his country's heritage, is planning to prevent the transfer of the drawings, which he has stolen, to the States. When Borghini suspects Isobel of interfering with his plans, he kidnaps her, leading to the sort of grim and tense scenario that Lieberman does so well, and to a violent conclusion back in the States. Lieberman writes an elegant sentence, as always, and his art-world detailing, especially of maneuverings and backstabbings, seems splendidly on target. He miscalculates, though, in casting Borghini not just as a rabid patriot but as a serial killer; this count's passion is to create life-size dioramas based on Botticelli paintings, using human victims as models in the tableaus. It's a turn that stretches credibility, although it does lend the narrative Lieberman's characteristic dark hues, which readers will find in abundance in this literate, acidic thriller.
