The Venetian Heretic 'The Master of Historical Fiction' Sunday Times

<P>Venice is alive with the magic and bustle of Carnevale.<br><br>A city of mysterious masks and gorgeous palaces, of riches, patricians, intellectuals and artists. And amidst it all, something new is being born: magnificent voices are soaring above the spires, astonishing costumes are being crafted, and audiences are being transported, for the first time, by the power of the Opera.<br><br>And beneath it all: espionage, organised crime, and murder.<br><br>Swordsman Richard Hughes has arrived on the banks of the Grand Canal looking for a simpler life, only to be plunged - alongside Phillip de Chambray, a remarkable woman unable to show her true self - into the thick of the murkiest, most dangerous European politics, at a moment when someone is trying to destroy the opera, and Venice itself.<br><br><B>Rich with authentic detail, this is the story of a complex world not so different from our own, and Christian Cameron, the modern master of historical fiction, brings real history to life in a way no other author can.</B></P>