About the book: year / The novel is based on real events of the early 17th century - the history of the revolution in the Kingdom of Bohemia, which led to the beginning of the Thirty Years' War. However, the text uses many mystical Prague legends: among the characters there are Rabbi Ben Betzalel and his Golem, Master John Dee (alchemist and personal magician of Queen Elizabeth of England), the famous Emperor Rudolf, who patronized the occultists, and so on. The style is a “funny gothic novel”, in some way a well-disguised parody of the “horrors” of Mrs. Radcliffe. The story is told on behalf of the secretary of the Prague Inquisition; all mystical events revolve around the Inquisition Tribunal, which is trying to conscientiously figure out what the hell is going on in good old Prague. Inquisitors are good and fair, heretics and magicians are bad. That's the concept. :-)Venue: Prague and Paris. Time - 1611-1613. The text contains a number of allusions to Alexander Dumas the Father and his “musketeer” novels; at least among the characters there are the young Cardinal Richelieu, Queen Marie de Medici, and the very young Louis XIII.