The Raphael Affair is the first in the Jonathan Argyll/Flavia di Stefano series by Iain Pears, who is much better known, I think for his non-series title,
An Instance of the Fingerpost. This is one of my top ten or fifteen favorite series, and I really wish Pears would write some more of these.
Affair has dropped to £1.99 at Kindle UK.
link:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00HY59D8E
Spoiler:
Quote:
First in the Italian art-history crime series featuring English dealer and sleuth Jonathan Argyll, from the author of the best-selling masterpiece 'An Instance of the Fingerpost'.
Flavia di Stefano is the kind of Italian beauty that art dealer Jonathon Argyll doesn't normally get to meet in his line of work. But, it turns out, all he had to do was get caught breaking into one of Rome's churches – for Flavia is the Art Theft officer tasked with interviewing Jonathon. A strange way to meet, perhaps, but then Jonathon has an even stranger tale to tell.
His claim that the church contains a lost classic, hidden under another painting, is treated with cautious scepticism. But when the picture first vanishes, then turns up in the hands of a British art dealer claiming it's a newly discovered Raphael, it's clear there's more to it than meets the eye. When vandalism is followed by murder, it's up to Jonathan and Flavia to discover just how much more – a quest for the true nature of a painting with a lethal history…
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