The Gypsy Madonna
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- €7.99
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- €7.99
Publisher Description
FROM THE NUMBER ONE BESTSELLING AUTHOR
A priceless Titian masterpiece. A sumptuous French Chateau with a deadly secret. And a mystery hidden in a Bordeaux village that will change their lives forever…
When elegant Anouk, a dealer in American antiques, dies unexpectedly, she leaves the Metropolitan museum an uncatalogued, multimillion dollar painting by Titian. Her son, Mischa, had no idea she had even owned it and becomes determined to discover the story behind the painting.
This mystery sends him on the trail of his own history, back to the French village of his childhood. There he hopes to uncover the origins of the Gypsy Madonna; he never expects to find himself.
Lose yourself in this story of epic romance and dark mystery set against the backdrop of occupied France and post-war America.
***PRAISE FOR SANTA MONTEFIORE***
‘Nobody does epic romance like Santa Montefiore’ JOJO MOYES
‘An enchanting read overflowing with deliciously poignant moments’ DINAH JEFFERIES on Songs of Love and War
‘Santa Montefiore hits the spot for my like few other writers’ SARRA MANNING
‘One of our personal favourites’ THE TIMES on The Last Secret of the Deverills
‘Accomplished and poetic’ Daily Mail
‘Santa Montefiore is a marvel’ Sunday Express
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
British author Montefiore (Last Voyage of the Valentina) offers up an uneven mix of family intrigue and international mystery in her latest. When Anouk, the ailing mother (and business partner) of Manhattan antiques dealer Mischa, donates The Gypsy Madonna, a previously unknown Titian painting, to the Met shortly before her death, Mischa is astonished; he never knew she owned the painting. After Mischa vows to discover how the artwork came into his mother's possession, the novel flashes back to his troubled childhood in postwar Bordeaux, France. He and Anouk are shunned by their fellow villagers, but after a charismatic American, Coyote, arrives and wins Anouk's and Mischa's hearts, the dashing stranger's celebrity-like status among the locals rubs off on Mischa and Anouk. The three, at Coyote's insistence, move to New Jersey, but after several years of playing house, Coyote disappears, and Mischa begins to run with a rough crowd. Graphic sex scenes add grit, but Mischa's coming-of-age mostly putters along until the book's concluding section, when Mischa's globe-trotting investigation into the truth about the painting lays bare a number of secrets. Unfortunately, the bulk of the book is an extended flashback that lacks narrative urgency.
