Beautiful ruins : a novel

In 1962 Italy, the famously disastrous filming of 20th Century Fox’s Cleopatra brings together a wildly disparate bunch of characters: the unfortunate owner of a perpetually empty Italian hotel, a stunning American starlet who may or may not be at death’s door, a would-be novelist who can’t get past Chapter One, a venal Hollywood public relations hack, and the legendary drinker, fighter, lover, actor, and movie star, Richard Burton. When this motley crew collides, they end up unintentionally changing each other’s lives for decades to come in this beautifully observed novel, which deftly blends fact and fiction.