In the Garden of Monsters

With this inventive spin on the Hades and Persephone myth, King (Feast of Sorrow) takes readers to Italy’s Sacro Bosco, the eponymous garden, in 1948. Amnesiac Julia Lombardi makes a living as an artist model while studying to be a painter. When an opportunity to sit for Salvador Dalí arises, Julia jumps at it, eager to witness a master at work. The gig takes her to Palazzo Orsini in Bomarzo, where the mysterious Ignazio hosts her and the dismissive, misogynistic Dalí. Julia is simultaneously drawn to and repelled by Ignazio, and he is equally obsessed with her. As painting sessions begin in the Sacro Bosco, Julia experiences strange things: the garden’s many monster statues appear to move, there’s a green glow in the woods at night, and visions of ghosts haunt her. All the while, Dalí refers to her as Proserpina, the subject she’s portraying in his painting, and tempts her with pomegranate seeds. While the core of the myth remains the same, King makes the familiar tale feel fresh with her unusual and enthralling setting, which eerily blurs the real and the surreal. This is an exciting reinterpretation. Agent: Amaryah Orenstein, Go Literary. (Sept.)