Art, power, desire, and illusion collide in a hypnotic new novel from Olivia Laing, set in the months leading up to the murder of Pier Paolo Pasolini in 1975. It is September 1974. Two men meet in Venice. One, Nicholas, is a young artist, plausible, English, desperate. The other is Danilo Donati, the magician of Italian cinema, the illusionist responsible for realizing the spectacular visions of Fellini and Pasolini. Donati is in Venice to produce sketches for Fellini’s Casanova. A young apprentice is just what he needs. He brings Nicholas back to Rome and introduces him to the looking-glass world of Cinecittà, the studio where Casanova’s Venice will be ingeniously assembled. In the spring, the lovers move together to the set of Salò, Pasolini’s horrifying fable of fascism. But Nicholas