The New Republic

Florence and Baghdad: Renaissance Art and Arab Science By Hans Belting Translated by Deborah Lucas Schneider (Belknap Press, 303 pp., $39.95) READ MORE >>

The Escorial: Art and Power in the Renaissance By Henry Kamen (Yale University Press, 291 pp., $35) READ MORE >>

The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown (Doubleday, 454 pp., $24.95) The Rule of Four By Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason (The Dial Press, 372 pp., $24) Breaking the Da Vinci Code: Answers to the Questions Everyone's Asking By Darrel L. Bock (Nelson Books, 188 pp., $19.99) Q By Luther Blissett (Harcourt, 750 pp., $26) READ MORE >>

THE EYE OF THE LYNX: GALILEO, HIS FRIENDS, AND THE BEGINNINGS OF MODERN NATURAL HISTORY By David Freedberg(University of Chicago Press, 513pp., $30) READ MORE >>