Sarah Dunant

The Birth of Venus: A Novel is a 2003 novel by Sarah Dunant, a bestselling British author. The story is set in the late 15th century in Florence, Italy.

My lady, Fiammetta Bianchini, was plucking her eyebrows and biting color into her lips when the unthinkable happened and the Holy Roman Emperor’s army blew a hole in the wall of God’s eternal city, letting in a flood of half-starved, half-crazed troops bent on pillage and punishment.Thus begins In the Company of …