When the reigning pope dies, Luca loses his patron -- though not his power or his iron will -- and his faith, already shaken by his past, is tested anew. On the eve of the papal election, the woman who saved his life and for whom, even in exile, he has nourished a deep and abiding love, comes again into his life. The wounds of the past are reopened, and Rossini finds himself in a new crisis of political responsibility and faces the turmoil of his own spirit.

This compelling drama of love and passion, political intrigue, and heady suspense shows once again why Morris West is one of the greatest novelists of our time.