Umberto Eco

The year is 1327. Franciscans in a wealthy Italian abbey are suspected of heresy, and Brother William of Baskerville arrives to investigate. When his delicate mission is suddenly overshadowed by seven bizarre deaths, Brother William turns detective.

William collects evidence, deciphers secret symbols and coded manuscripts, and digs into the eerie labyrinth of the abbey where extraordinary things are happening under the cover of night. A spectacular popular and critical success, The Name of the Rose is not only a narrative of a murder investigation but an astonishing chronicle of the Middle Ages.

It's 1992. Hack writer Colonna is offered a fee he can't refuse to ghostwrite a memoir. His subject, Braggadocio, is convinced that Mussolini's corpse was a body double and part of a wider Fascist plot. When a body is found stabbed to death in a back alley, even Colonna is jolted out of his complacency.

Nineteenth-century Europe abounds with conspiracy both ghastly and mysterious. Jesuits plot against Freemasons. French criminals plan bombings by day and celebrate black masses by night. Every nation has its own secret service, perpetrating forgeries, plots, and massacres. But what if, behind all of these conspiracies, lies just one man...

Lorenzo and Lucia, both from peasant families, are planning their wedding. However, after meeting the villainous Don Rodrigo, the couple are forced to flee their village. Their dangerous journey in exile takes them through one of the most dramatic eras in Italian history, filled with war, famine and plague. Will they ever be able to find happiness together?