Years on from MY SWORDHAND IS SINGING, Peter is still on the trail of the Shadow Queen. His search leads him to Venice, a city whose beauty disguises many ugly secrets. Marko and Sorrel meet there for the first time. Drawn together by the mystery of what has happened both to Sorrel's father, as some strange madness prevents him from sleeping, and Marko's father, a doctor who has been imprisoned for trying to help his old friend. Marko and Sorrel's search will take them from the city to Murano where her father, Simono, a renowned glassmaker had been fashioning a tiara for the enchanting and enigmatic Venetia. The tiara is, Sorrel believes, unfinished and worse still it's gone missing. Venetia wants it in time for the coronation of the Doge. From there they follow a more sinister path which will lead them to an unholy massing of the Shadow Queen's new vampire army on the plague islands of the lagoon, and to Peter as he prepares for his last battle. This fabled city with its lapping waterways, its crumbling magnificence, dark, twisting alleyways and surprising piazzas is the perfect setting for Marcus's captivating gothic novel of love and loss in C18th Venice.