A leading authority on the Italian Renaissance, Lauro Martines was born in Chicago, but has spent most of his life in Europe. He and his late wife, the novelist Julia O’Faolain, lived in Florence for six years, as well as in Paris and London. He is the author of the novel Loredana: A Venetian Tale and twelve non-fiction books, including April Blood: Florence and the Plot Against the Medici and Fire in the City: Savonarola and the Struggle for Renaissance Florence, both of which have been translated into five languages. With his late wife, he was the author of Not in God’s Image: Women in History from the Greeks to the Victorians. He holds a PhD in history from Harvard University, was Professor of European History at the University of California for many years, and held visiting professorships at the Warburg Institute, the University of London, the University of Washington and the Écoledes Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris. Lauro lives in London. Chronicle of a Good-Looking Family is his second novel.