A quote by Milan Kundera in Chapter 21 sums up the beauty and power of this book: "There would be nothing more obvious,/more tangible, than the present moment./And yet it eludes us completely./All the sadness of life lies in that fact."
It's not often that I love a book the way I loved this one. Recommended by my friend Marla, Beautiful Ruins is a masterpiece. It follows the path of quite a few characters, the main ones being Pasquale, the owner of the Adequate View Hotel in Porto Vergogna, Dee Moray, the actress who arrives in the little cliff village by boat, Michael Deane, the Hollywood bigshot, Richard Burton and Liz Taylor, and many others, all interesting and wonderfully portrayed.
To detail anything would probably spoil this review. Over fifty years, we read the story of the making of Cleopatra, the love affair of Liz and Dick, images of World War II, Italy, and the lives and intentions of these people. It's fictional, and fascinating. The book moves deftly and makes the reader never want to stop. This is one of the best books I've read in quite a while. Read it!