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Lead book review

The love that conquered every barrier – including the Iron Curtain

Iain Pears tells the dramatic story of how two art historians – one English, one Russian – met by chance in Venice and found they couldn’t live without each other

3 May 2025

9:00 AM

3 May 2025

9:00 AM

Parallel Lives: A Love Story from a Lost Continent Iain Pears

William Collin, pp.271, 18.99

In our age of cosmetic fantasy, a dramatic love story between two bespectacled art historians sounds implausible. But add in the Montague-Capulet effect of the Iron Curtain, along with a fearless Russian heroine who proved that love can conquer every barrier, and you have an enchanting tale: a completely true one, beautifully written by the art historian and novelist Iain Pears, the author of An Instance of the Fingerpost among many other books.

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