A mysterious painting, a dying pope and many interests are at play in a momentous conflict over the transformation of the Church: this is a dark thriller and a contemplation of spiritual themes and art.

After living his entire life in Cape Town and having a lot of pain from his past, British painter Ernest Hamilton decides to spend some time in Rome. In contact with its beautiful art, he experiences his second youth, partly thanks to Chiara, a young restorer with whom he has immediately clicked. The work the young woman is restoring – a Baroque painting of no special worth, but with an unusual subject: the collapse of St Peter’s Basilica – vanishes into thin air. A few days later, the painting reappears in a location where another crime has just taken place: the abduction of the Ivorian cardinal Maltiade who, according to many, is the favourite candidate for succeeding the Pope, who is gravely ill. Why does someone want to stop him from becoming pontiff? Could it be because, as the first black pope, he intends to relocate St Peter’s to the Ivory Coast? And what does Chiara’s painting have to do with this? In order to discover it, Ernest finds himself investigating a tangle of occult sciences and dangerous conspiracies.

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