States of Grace

Franzicco Ragoczy di Santo-Germano is a successful merchant in Venice. His lavish lifestyle and rumored cache of magnificent jewels have attracted the wrong sort of attention, and without Santo-Germano's noble--and papal--connections, he might be imprisoned, his property confiscated. Also under surveillance is the vampire's mistress, the lovely and talented musician Pier-Ariana Salier.

Elsewhere, Ragoczy's publishing business is being investigated by the Inquisition. Erneste van Amsteljaxter, a writer whose intelligence Ragoczy finds attractive, is tarred with the brush of heresy. Ragoczy is trying to help her, when he learns that Pier-Ariana has disappeared.

Back in Venice Santo-Germano finds that his fortune has been embezzled, and that he is accused of kidnapping, and possibly murdering, a young man who had been spying on the vampire and his mistress. Another spy has discovered Santo-Germano's true nature and intends to kill him before he can feast on all of Venice!

About the Author

Chelsea Quinn Yarbro is the first woman to be named a Living Legend by the International Horror Guild (2006). She was honored in 2009 as a Bram Stoker Lifetime Achievement by the Horror Writers association. (The third woman, after Joyce Carol Oates and Anne Rice, to be so honored.) Yarbro is also one of only two women ever to be named as Grand Master of the World Horror Convention (2003). She is the recipient of the Fine Foundation Award for Literary Achievement (1993) and (along with Fred Saberhagen) was awarded the Knightly Order of the Brasov Citadel by the Transylvanian Society of Dracula in 1997. In 1995 Yarbro was the only novelist guest of the Romanian government for the First World Dracula Congress, sponsored by the Transylvanian Society of Dracula, the Romanian Bureau of Tourism and the Romanian Ministry of Culture. She has been nominated for the Edgar, World Fantasy, and Bram Stoker Awards and was the first female president of the Horror Writers Association. Her manuscripts are being archived at Bowling Green University. Yarbro is one of the first women to have made a successful and long career writing modern supernatural fiction.