This record of an artist's adventures in the demimonde of 18th-century London, by the author of Brunelleschi's Dome
and Ex-Libris, has every bit of the former books' attention to detail but little of their fluidity. When a talented young artist, Sir George Cautley, goes to London from Shropshire in 1780 to make something of himself, he meets a glamorous, mystifying woman named Lady Petronella Beauclair. As he paints her portrait, she tells him the labyrinthine story of an old man named Tristano, one of Europe's most renowned castrati from decades ago, who is a dormant social presence in London. As Cautley begins studies with Sir Endymion Starker, a famous artist he meets while gambling, he also makes the acquaintance of Starker's mistress, Eleanora, who has her own sad tale to tell. She claims that Cautley's rival for Lady Beauclair's affections is the same man who humiliated her many years previously. After a maze of masquerades—some at parties, others in real life—nothing turns out to be as it seems, and Cautley finds himself committing acts he would have never dreamed possible, from sadomasochism to murder. King's craft is uneven: at times his writing has a lush, impressionistic glow, but many of the book's clambering sentences require tremendous navigation to finish, with no reward. The mysteries and unexpected plot twists of the book are enjoyable enough, but at times they are tenuous or strained. There are some memorable scenes, but in its stabs at something higher than simple entertainment, the book falls short. (Nov.)
