The Enchantress of Florence »

One of the most celebrated writers of our time, SALMAN RUSHDIE is the author of ten previous novels— Grimus, Midnight's Children (for which he won the Booker Prize in 1981, the Booker of Bookers in 1993, and, in 2008, the Best of the Booker), Shame, The Satanic Verses, Haroun and the Sea of Stories, The Moor's Last Sigh, The Ground Beneath Her Feet, Fury, Shalimar the Clown, and The Enchantress of Florence. He has also published four works of non-fiction, a collection of short stories, and edited two fiction anthologies. In June 2007, Rushdie was appointed a Knight Bachelor by Queen Elizabeth II for services to literature. He holds the rank Commandeur in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of France and began a five-year term as Distinguished Writer in Residence at Emory University in 2007. In May 2008, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and also in 2008, the London Times ranked Rushdie thirteenth on their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945". For two years he served as president of The PEN American Center, the world's oldest human rights organization, and is the chair of PEN's World Voices Festival of International Literature, an annual literary festival he began in New York in 2001. Rushdie is currently working on the film version of Midnight's Children.

The Enchantress of Florence is the story of a mysterious woman, a great beauty believed to possess the powers of enchantment and sorcery, attempting to command her own destiny in a man’s world. It is the story of two cities at the height of their powers–the hedonistic Mughal capital, in which the brilliant emperor Akbar the Great wrestles daily with questions of belief, desire, and the treachery of his sons, and the equally sensual city of Florence during the High Renaissance, where Niccolò Machiavelli takes a starring role as he learns, the hard way, about the true brutality of power. Profoundly moving and completely absorbing, The Enchantress of Florence is a dazzling book full of wonders by one of the world’s most important living writers.

Bloomberg

Blending ornate imagery with knowing, saber-swift wit to conjure up cunning escapes, dashing victories and legendary seductions.beyond its magical razzle-dazzle lays a work of steely contemporary relevance.