Also featured in “Vittorio The Vampire”, by Ann Rice, is Fra Filippo Lippi, a painter who lived in the first half of the 1400’s in Italy. I get the feeling, more and more, from Rice, that she is trapped in this genre by her fans and by her publishers, but that she really wants to write historical fiction about the Renaissance. This book, which I just finished, was really good, except for the parts that were about vampires. Rice is a wonderful writer. It’s quite a shame that she has to spoil it by writing about vampires. Her knowledge of the Renaissance is quite extrordinary, and her descriptions of the period painters are sufficient to make me want to go to see these works in person.

Anyways, Filippo winds up being a major character in the book, although he never appears personally in the action, except by way of a recounting of a glimpse of him by a younger Vittorio.

And, by the way, his paintings are indeed beautiful.