Domino

By the author of The New York Times's bestsellers Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling, Brunelleschi's Dome, and the award-winning novel, Ex-Libris.

A New York Times "Notable Book", The New York Times Book Review, Holiday Books Issue, Christmas 2003

Ross King's Domino is a Rabelaisian journey into the hurly-burly world of 1770s London. From the drawing rooms of the city's finest to their country manors, from the garret room of George Cautley, a hapless young artist adrift in the gilded world he wants to conquer, to the magnificent opera houses of Milan with their dark secrets, Ross King does more than paint a portrait of a time long gone, but brings it to life with an immediacy that only the finest historical writers can achieve.

Domino is the story of the mysterious and beautiful Lady Beauclair, the castrato singer Tristano, the naive Cautley, and Eleanora, mistress and muse. Suspenseful, menacing and laced with black humor, this picaresque tale of art, artists, patrons, and ne'er-do-wells is filled with surprises, victories, and tragedies, told with the pace of a thriller and the richness of a restored old painting.