Jonathan Argyll is no fighter, he's a lover. Art lover that is. And where better to indulge his passion than Rome--where the love of art is part of its national identity. But as Jonathan himself says, art and art history is "a nasty, vicious profession" and the mild-mannered, self-depreciating young Englishman finds himself a suspect in a murder/forgery episode. This misadventure brings him into contact with General Taddeo Bottando, the Chief of the Italian National Art Theft Squad who, at the age of 60, knows that he should give up cigarettes & coffee and exercise more, but figures the effort would probably kill him. Jonathan also meets Bottando's glamorous assistant, Flavia Stefano, one of those "wonderful" women, Bottando muses, "that only Italy could produce," and the two soon finds themselves drawn together by their mutual love of art and the danger associated with the high-stakes world of paintings and antiquities.

---

The Raphael Affair. HBJ, 1992, 1990
The Titian Committee. HBJ, 1993, 1991
The Bernini Bust. HB, 1994, 1992
The Last Judgement. Scribner, 1996
Giotto's Hand. Scribner, 1997, 1994
Death and Restoration. Scribner, 1998, 1996
The Immaculate Deception. Scribner, 2000

---