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“Strathern combines diligent archival research with an exemplary narrative verve and keeps the pages turning.” Financial Times
“A vivid tale in great detail.” Times Literary Supplement
“Death in Florence grips the reader from the first page.” New Statesman
“With reproductions of Renaissance artwork and architecture as well as passages from contemporary historians, critics, and notable figures, Strathern’s history envelopes the reader in the world of medieval Italy, with its vitality and violence, intellect and turmoil…A thrilling and informative chronicle of one of the Renaissance’s most notorious dynasties.” Library Journal (starred review)
“Eschewing a one-sided approach, Strathern fashions an engrossing portrayal of the two legendary fifteenth-century figures who shaped Renaissance Florence: Lorenzo (the Magnificent) de’ Medici and Girolamo Savonarola…In well-considered prose, Strathern argues that these two figures battled for the ‘direction that humanity should take,’ further illustrating the struggle for Florence’s soul via Savonarola-convert Sandro Botticelli’s artistic descent from exuberant classicism to brimstone imagery.” Publishers Weekly
“Savonarola gets terrible press, admits novelist and historian Strathern in this lively history of a bizarre period during Italy’s golden age…Strathern does not take sides as he delivers a deft, often gruesome account of events in that distant era when Christianity was a matter of life and death.” Kirkus Reviews