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Name: David Hewson - Lucifer's Shadow (epub)
Format: epub
Size: 929.1 KB

Title: Lucifer's Shadow
Author: David Hewson
Language: English
Year: 2007
Subjects: Fiction, Suspense, Mystery, Thriller, Historical, Music
Publisher: Delta
ISBN: 9780307423153
Total pages: 144 str.

In an ancient burial ground on an island off Venice, a young woman's casket is pried open, an object is wrenched from her hands, and an extraordinary adventure begins.

From the moment he arrives in Venice, Daniel Forster is seduced by the city's mystery and eroticism. An earnest young academic, Daniel has come for a summer job cataloguing a private collector's library. But when Daniel's employer sends him to buy a stolen violin from a petty thief, a chain reaction of violence and deception ignites. Suddenly Daniel is drawn into a police investigation-and a tempest swirling around a beautiful woman, a mysterious palazzo, and a lost musical masterpiece dating back centuries. With each step he takes, Daniel unwittingly retraces a journey that began in 1733, when another young man came to Venice. And when, in this realm of intrigue and beauty, two lovers came face-to-face with a killer-and a mystery was born. Separated by centuries, two tales of passion, betrayal, and danger collide in David Hewson's dazzling novel. Sweeping us from the intrigue of Vivaldi's Venice to the gritty world of a modern cop, from the genius of a prodigy to the greed of a killer, Lucifer's Shadow builds to a shattering crescendo-and one last, breathtaking surprise.

From the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly
In this Venetian thriller, British author Hewson (A Season for the Dead) offers a tantalizing tale of intrigue, murder and sex. Two props propel the action: a concerto penned by a young Jewish woman in 1733 and performed once, anonymously, before its disappearance, and her unique violin. When in the present day this instrument is snatched from an obscure grave and the anonymous concerto is discovered in a long-forgotten hiding place, an innocent English scholar is drawn into an increasingly dangerous game of deception. Through the 18th-century letters and journals of a printer's apprentice, the reader discovers the secret of the concerto, while Daniel Forster, in Venice to work for an ailing art collector, relives the mystery connected to the beautiful piece of music. The story set during the glory days of Vivaldi is more vivid, compelling and romantic than the contemporary one, as Daniel's a bit of a cold fish. And if the various elements don't quite add up to a satisfying whole, the intricate view of Venice with its palazzos and sewers, its concert halls and old Jewish ghetto is more than ample compensation.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Starred Review This intelligent and highly detailed thriller by British author Hewson (A Season for the Dead, 2003) rivals Perez-Reverte's The Flanders Panel (1994) in historical intricacy, complexity of motive, and multileveled storytelling. Masterfully plotted, the novel alternates between present-day and eighteenth-century Venice, following flawed and unwary innocents down the devil's path, tempted by visions of fame, personal glory, and love. In 1733, a wealthy patron of the arts supplies a lovely and talented Jewish woman with a Guarneri violin and the venue for her debut as a concert soloist in a world hostile to both women and Jews. In modern Venice, a young scholar is manipulated into selling a stolen antique violin and pretending authorship of a brilliant concerto recently unearthed in his employer's basement. Both stories follow naive young men who fall in love with gifted and troubled women musicians, then become involved in tracking killers who leave behind only traces of their female victims. The pungent canals of beautiful Venice carry readers on a metaphorical journey, tracing the spread of evil through ghetto, church, concert hall, and even the mansions of the elite. Prepare for a devilish ride in which beauty masks wickedness, and righteousness is relative. Jennifer Baker
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