This is Tiffany Thayer’s massive, epic telling of the story behind the painting of Mona Lisa…a book so large, and a story so vast, that it took sixteen years to write, 1,226 pages to tell, and had to be divided into three volumes to publish. Now it’s finally back in print after over 65 years lost in obscurity.
The sprawling, adventurous novel is presented as a “long-lost” manuscript by poet Francois Villon that dramatizes the sex, decadence, intrigue and violence of Queen Joan II’s scandalous rule of Renaissance Italy as she pursued her naked desires while also thwarting the Prince of Taranto’s nefarious plots to steal her throne.
Mona Lisa herself never appears in Mona Lisa: The Prince of Taranto, which was a prequel to her story, and was intended to be the first of a dozen equally massive novels in the saga, which were never published. The commercial failure of the first book in 1956, and Thayer’s death in 1959, doomed the other novels, assuming that any were actually completed, which seems likely, given the author’s afterword at the end of volume three, teasing that next book was only months away from publication. But even on its own, this huge novel is a masterpiece of historical fiction, a rousing read that’s timeless.
“Thayer knows his Renaissance history. Being an irrepressible wag, however, he cannot write without burlesquing his subject.It’s impossible to take this thing seriously, since the author refuses to. Yet, if it is merely a literary romp, it is surely the longest in the history of letters. Actually, Mona Lisa is fun. Lots of blood is sloshed about and boudoirs are as busy as Macy’s basement on a Saturday morning.” Minneapolis Star-Tribune
“It is not an opus one can lightly dismiss. One may quarrel with its taste—as I do frequently—or be shocked or even angered by its more lurid descriptions. But it has to be admitted that as a sheer feat, it is an amazing and an unforgettable piece of work. He takes the reader on an amazing and basically accurate tour through the sewers of Renaissance Naples and he is an able and an illuminating guide.” New York Times
“A juicy, medieval morass. Mr. Thayer achieves a kind of narcotic euphoria for the reader.” Saturday Evening Post
“Thayer conceived the idea about writing a novel about Mona Lisa, but somewhere along the line the project was infected with verbal elephantiasis. This thickly populated costume saga abounds with action, intrigue, and most of all, with seductions and bedroom activity of every kind.” Evansville Press
“It’s galloping, literary gastritis…400,000 words of hard-packed eroticism.” Chicago Tribune
“A stunning recreation of the most exciting era in all of history…generating excitement to a fine pitch of frenzy for nearly 1300 pages.” Longview Daily News
“Thayer has a fetching manner of writing, to say nothing of his impish humor.” Los Angeles Times
“The characters roister with intrigue and undiminished gusto. The reader will find it easy and enjoyable to immerse himself (or, more likely, herself) in this pullulating, Renaissance whoop-de-do. If this monumental project catches the public’s fancy, and there’s a good chance that it will, we will be reading three-decker Thayer for years to come. Start building those bookcases, boys!” St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Tiffany Thayer /
Historical, Literary Fiction, Romance, Sexy Fiction
