3 out of 4 stars
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The Girl Who Knew Da Vinci is a romantic historical mystery written by Belle Ami that follows Angela Renatus, a Renaissance art historian who starts off as an intern and is plagued by both her insufferable boss Alberto and her visions of her past lives. Alberto, seeking wealth and fame from the art world, plans to use Angela to track down an unsigned, but original Da Vinci piece. The much sought after piece depicts a forbidden love affair that was never legitimized, and therefore was never formally recognized.
Accompanying her on her quest to find the elusive piece is Alex Caine, a wealthy art detective, who witnessed Angela’s supernatural link firsthand and became unquestionably bound to her ever since. Together, Angela and Alex leave Los Angeles and go on a tour of Tuscany and Rome, following clues as they are revealed via Angela’s visions of her past two lives.
As the duo encroaches upon the location of the unclaimed artwork, their relationship intensifies to dizzying heights, just as their previous reincarnations had before them. During this reincarnation, the two are resolved to break the curse that surrounds Da Vinci’s piece that shatters their happiness in its infancy.
I give this book 3 out of 4 stars because there are minimal typos and the text looks professionally edited. The romance and mystery aspects are balanced; however, at times I found myself wondering about the necessity of the number of sex scenes throughout the book. If you aren’t into reading about sex, it would be best to skip this book since it happens often.
I cannot give this book 4 stars because in essence only two characters were given time to be developed, despite there being three couples, and even then Alex and Angela don’t have any memorable characteristics. I wanted them to prevail not for their sake, but because their antagonist Alberto effectively repulsed me. If you have a problem with sexual assault, there are brief mentions at the beginning and end of the book, so be wary.
I liked the pacing of the book as the romance and mystery aspects would happen one after the other, ensuring that if I was getting bored with one genre it would switch focus within a few pages. I also liked the presence of two past lives, which allowed two different time periods to be explored, the High Renaissance and Italy during World War II 1944.
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The Girl Who Knew Da Vinci
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