This is a most unusual tale. It is the love story of a severely burned ex-porn star and a schizophrenic sculptor on it's surface. Which is interesting enough--both are lovably flawed fascinating characters in their on right. But soon the other stories, spanning centuries, begin. Each is a heartbreaking yet uplifting story of love. All are told in language I can only call magical--I found myself often stopping to re-read sections because I wanted to savor their beauty a bit longer. Reading this book felt like sorting through a wondrous box of treasure--there are well researched intellectual prizes, laugh out loud humor (advice--carefully read the menu for Christmas dinner), tear jerking moments that take the breath away, love that creates a longing in the heart, physical pain that make the body recoil at the reading..........and so much more. This is Davidson's first book, and we will be hearing much, much more about him in the coming years--he is a story teller extraordinaire. This book is quite graphic in it's detail of the care of burn victims and in it's depiction of violence, so it isn't for the faint at heart. But both are a very necessary part of the whole book--the ugliness and the horror being a corridor to the amazing beauty and peace contained within. Five stars just don't seem enough for this amazing book.

I would recommend this book especially to folks who liked The Time Travelers Wife or The Little Book by Seldon Edwards, but anyone who loves a great love story and doesn't mind some grit will fall under the spell of this book. Fans of Dante's Inferno will find large sections of this book fascinating as well.