Lord Lyons

At thirty-five, after thirteen years in Athens, Richard Lyons was ready to abandon diplomacy. Instead, his next posting sent him to Rome, where foreign armies guarded the Pope against his own people.

In 1853, the Papal States were a tense outpost of European politics: Austrian troops occupied Ancona, French soldiers held Rome, and Cardinal Antonelli directed the Government’s foreign policy. Lyons, quiet and unassuming, had long felt passed over; now he had a delicate mission and a wary city to win over. Britain’s dealings with the Papacy ranged from proposed diplomatic relations to disputes over religious activity, with prisons and political suspicion close at hand. Lyons believed plain dealing could open doors—but how far could discretion carry him in a city where even a Bible could become a source of conflict?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.