Carlo Gambino : Life Without the Mob: An Autobiography

from LisCarey

Baudolino is the twelve-year-old son of a peasant in twelfth-century Italy when he finds Frederick Barbarossa, the Holy and Roman Emperor, lost in the local pea-soup fog. Impressed by the young man's cleverness, Barbarossa quickly cuts a deal with Baudolino's father to take him back to his court....

from LisCarey

Is this a fantasy? It's hard to say with any certainty. Undoubtedly we see many fantastic and magical things as Baudolino recounts his journeys, but Baudolino's a liar.We meet Baudolino in 1204, as Constantinople is being sacked and burned by the Fourth Crusade. He rescues a high-ranking court of...

from mamzel

The chance mention of the possible existence of a man named Prebster Johanne by an old monk named Otto to a young man with an amazing ability to create stories turns into an entire life story about the search for this man. The story opens with the sack of Constantinople. A noble man, Niketas, is ...

from DinadansFriend

A picaresque tour across the Mediterranean and on to China. Our hero likes the Buddhists best, but he has to come home eventually. I think that Eco is better in Italian than English, and without the murder mystery, this book is a good deal less popular.

from arouse77

the Forrest Gump of Byzantium, Baudolino always seems to find himself in the midst of earth-changing history with no hope of having his role acknowledged. a teller of tall tales and general scoundrel our hero is likable but not to be taken without skepticism. a rollicking read, enjoyable if stilt...