An old man named Mimo Vitaliani lies dying in a remote Piedmont monastery where thirty-two monks keep vigil. A mysterious locked pieta accompanies him, its faces forbidden to be seen, while the abbot waits for a final word. Mimo was born in 1904 in France to Italian parents, never fitting in and remaining unusually small. His father, a stone carver named Michelangelo by hubris, died in war, and Mimo becomes an apprentice at twelve, learning sculpture and carving his first works in the Ligurian village of Pietra d'Alba, where he meets Viola Orsini.
In a remote monastery perched perilously on top of a crag in Piedmont, Italy, an old man lies dying. Thirty-two monks stand vigil at the deathbed; Mimo Vitaliani has lived among them for 40 years, yet few of them know exactly why. Nor did Vitaliani come alone, but with a mysterious statue that is kept under lock and key in the depths of the Sacra di San Michele,
Born in France to Italian parents in 1904, at the dawn of a new world order, Mimo is destined never quite to fit (nor, incidentally, ever to grow taller than 4ft 6in). His father was a stone carver who had hubris enough to christen the boy Michelangelo before getting himself conscripted and blown to bits; Mimo refuses the name, and yet finds himself taking up the art all the same.
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