Downloading Florence Syndrome

Florence Syndrome is a lyrical, intimate novella set in 1910, in the beating heart of Florence.

Alessandra Corsi, a 25-year-old Florentine artist, lives for the quiet company of her easel and sketchbook. Her days are spent sketching the masters in the Uffizi, avoiding society, content with paint and silence. Until one August morning she notices a woman falter in front of Botticelli’s Birth of Venus.

Elizabeth Hughes is an Englishwoman of thirty-five, visiting Florence after her father’s death, carrying her grief and her careful manners like heavy luggage. Overwhelmed by beauty, she experiences what locals call “La sindrome di Firenze”—a dizzying spell of awe in the face of art. Alessandra goes to her aid, and so begins a journey neither expected: through sun-bleached streets, secret osterie, and the countryside by steam train to Siena, and into the hidden world of an artist’s studio.

As Elizabeth sheds her English restraint, she becomes both muse and lover, discovering a sensual and emotional freedom she never imagined. Alessandra, who thought she knew passion, is undone by the quiet boldness of a woman stepping into her own desires. Against the backdrop of Botticelli’s masterpieces, they find not just beauty but its dizzying cost: to be seen, to be loved, to love beyond rules.

Florence Syndrome is a tender, sapphic love story about art, memory, and the courage to let beauty change you. Perfect for readers of historical romance and intimate character-driven fiction, this novella invites you to walk Florence’s streets, to breathe its light, and to witness two women defy their time for the sake of love.