Ross King

Discover the prodigious global influence of il bel paese in this star-studded retelling of Italy's past-from a foremost author of historic Italy. The Shortest History books deliver thousands of years of history in one riveting, fast-paced book.

While the Civil War raged in America, another very different revolution was beginning to take shape across the Atlantic, in the studios of Paris....

Early in 1495, Leonardo da Vinci began work in Milan on what would become one of history's most influential and beloved works of art - The Last Supper....

Brunelleschi's Dome is the story of how a Renaissance genius bent men, materials, and the very forces of nature to build an architectural wonder we continue to marvel at today. Denounced at first as a madman, Brunelleschi was celebrated at the end as a genius....

We have all seen, whether live, in photographs or on postcards, some of Claude Monet's legendary water lily paintings....

A concise, star-studded retelling of Italy's past, from Caesar and Augustus to da Vinci and Michelangelo, tracing the story of a country with prodigious global influence—from a foremost author of historic Italy.

George Cautley, a hapless young artist trying to make his way in the gilded world of 1770s London, paints Lady Beauclair's portrait while she tells him the scandalous story of Tristano....