Ottoman Sultan
The Pindar Diamond
The storyline in The Pindar Diamond by Katie Hickman is somewhat complicated, unravelling gradually so that we readers only make full sense of it towards the end.
But for me its main strength is in its evocation of a time and place.
In this case it’s Venice in the 1600s. The plague is arriving. I could see the famous Venetian silhouette, the peeling plaster, the tiny bridges, the gondolas gliding silently along at night, pinpricks of light in the oily black water. I could hear the sound of the mellow church bell carrying clearly across the streets and canals.
It’s the height of summer, fiercely hot and the stench of the murky canals pervades the city. But merchantmen and their sleuths still ply their trade in luxurious fabrics, exotic spices and fabulous jewels in this centre of commerce.
Closer up I could picture the rich silks and brocades, the velvet doublets and pantaloons, the massive canopied beds, the painted courtesans in blood red damask robes, the legendary Venetian masks. 
But this is the seventeenth century. Life is cheap; hygiene is dubious; fortunes are lost and won at cards; freak shows parade those who are unfortunate enough to be born disabled or ugly or exceptional. Even in a convent, escaping daughters of noblemen with no vocation wear silk and embroidered slippers beneath their stiff black habits, wear their hair long beneath the regulation wimples, gorge themselves on luxury dishes.
The story flips from brothel to convent, gaming den to Sultan’s harem. It draws in a mermaid baby, tumbling acrobats, merchants and pirates and eunuchs, a giantess who gives her life to spare another woman’s baby degradation. All contribute to this vivid picture of a bygone era in a timeless city in Italy.
At the centre of the intrigue is the priceless Ottoman Sultan’s Blue diamond, a stone from India of rare and exceptional size and beauty, true blue-white, the ‘colour of moonlight’. Engraved in one facet is a Moghul inscription: My heart’s desire. It’s been carried in a velvet pouch; gnawed and wrenched from the dead hand of the Sultan’s mother; stolen by a nun; gambled with and lost at cards; but in the end even this fabulous gem is not to be compared to the value of enduring love.
An historical romance-cum-mystery full of scheming and exotic characters that will transport you to a different world, thanks to the linguistic skill of a writer.