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A Novel
by Laurent Binet
A pulse-quickening murder mystery set in Renaissance Florence by the renowned author of HHhH.
As dawn breaks over the city of Florence on New Year's Day 1557, Jacopo da Pontormo is discovered lying on the floor of a church, stabbed through the heart. Above him are the frescoes he labored over for more than a decade―masterpieces all, rivaling the works of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel. When guards search his quarters, they find an obscene painting of Venus and Cupid―with the face of Venus replaced by that of Maria de' Medici, the Duke of Florence's oldest daughter. The city erupts in chaos.
Who could have committed these crimes: murder and lèse-majesté? Giorgio Vasari, the great art historian, is picked to lead the investigation. Letters start to fly back and forth―between Maria and her aunt Catherine de' Medici, the queen of France; between Catherine and the scheming Piero Strozzi; and between Vasari and Michelangelo―carrying news of political plots and speculations about the identity of Pontormo's killer. The truth, when it comes to light, is as shocking as the bold new artworks that have made Florence the red-hot center of European art and intrigue.
Bursting with characters and historical color, Laurent Binet's Perspective(s) is a whodunit like no other―a labyrinthine murder mystery that shows us Renaissance Florence as we've never seen it before. This is a dark, dazzling, unforgettable read.
Dublin Literary Awards 2026 longlist
...as ever experienced grief as a sense of ordinary decisions that have been over-taxed with consequence, this will be a novel with powerful resonance." Perspective(s) by Laurent Binet, translated by Sam Taylor, is "filled with fun and irony. Binet affirms that the saviour of human life is faith in art and creation". Binet was award...
-Anne_Glasgow
"A crackerjack depiction of [Renaissance] political intrigue ... Binet masterfully weaves together the story's multiple threads. Readers will be captivated." ―Publishers Weekly
"This gossipy, epistolary novel is as full of epic characters as the Sistine Chapel ceiling: naughty Médicis, wine-drunk nuns, proto-Marxist painter's assistants ... Sinfully fun to read." ―The New Yorker
"Seriously enjoyable ... Brightly charismatic ... From this delectable book's clamor of voices and versions, Mr. Binet arrives at the truth of the crime." ―The Wall Street Journal
This information about Perspective(s) was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Laurent Binet was born in Paris in 1972. His first novel, HHhH, was named one of the best books of the year by The New York Times and received the Prix Goncourt du Premier Roman. His other novels include The Seventh Function of Language and Civilizations.
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