Very few people knew Antonia, despite her eventual fame as “La Stella di Venezia”. Antonio Vivaldi, violinist and composer, created her and made her his lifetime project. Based on the scant biographies of Vivaldi and his lifetime companion, Anna Giraud, Antonia of Venice is an unveiling of love, connected souls, music, power and tragedy.

The story lures the reader into the beauty and decadence of 18th century Venetian society and into the passions that drive and torment its characters. Antonia, prodigy of the violin and voice, develops from being Vivaldi’s star pupil into his musical colleague and the pride of Venetian musical conceit. In her adoration of the mercurial, lapsed priest, Antonia assumes a new identity and dedicates her life to his authority. Prioress Paolina Giraud, whose surname Antonia adopts, is the moderating, loving, rational presence in the lives of the two musicians.

Vivaldi’s domination of the Republic’s baroque ethos and his control of Antonia are challenged during Siena’s Palio in July, 1725, when Vivaldi and an ensemble of Venice’s best musicians add a musical fibre to the ancient celebration. In Siena, Antonia meets and falls in love with Orlando Sagredo, master planner of the Palio, and recognizes the emotional bondage she has never questioned. Kidnapped and returned to Venice, Antonia and Paolina generate a plan that leads to reunion and murder.

Antonia of Venice is inhabited by brilliant musicians, avaricious politicians and ineffectual rulers of the Republic of Venice. Through it all, the people and music Antonia loves take the reader into the depths of revenge and selflessness. Antonia of Venice advances the timeless, feminine heroic as a powerful and equal partner to the masculine.