MattRees.net

Some of the places featured in my novel Mozart’s Last Aria:

Today marks the anniversary of Mozart’s death. It was a tragedy for his family, who lost a loving, fun father and husband. A tragedy for music, which ought to have enjoyed another thirty years of productivity from this 35-year-old genius. Most of all, a tragedy — because he was murdered. For a few decades, we [...]

Write a review of one of my books on amazon.com or amazon.co.uk and get a chance to win a free copy of my novel Mozart’s Last Aria. Just write your review, send me the link to the review at mattreesbooks@gmail.com, and you’ll be entered in a drawing for a free, signed copy of the book. [...]

For the Western Mail, the main newspaper in my native Wales, I wrote about the importance of recent discoveries of Caravaggio’s youthful sketches, as well as how I came to write my novel A NAME IN BLOOD. Meanwhile, Declan Burke, author of the Crime Always Pays blog and one of Ireland’s premier crime novelists, reviews [...]

I stopped in at Radio Wales to meet the delightful Roy Noble, who has had a show every afternoon for a couple of decades. We chatted about my new Caravaggio novel A NAME IN BLOOD, as well as MOZART’S LAST ARIA and my Palestinian crime series. Listen here — the interview starts 12 minutes into [...]

Some great reviews online for my new Caravaggio novel A NAME IN BLOOD. The delightfully named ARRSE blog, which is mainly for members of the British military, rates the novel highly: A really good novel, based on real characters, real paintings and real events. I would suggest that you look up the actual pictures on [...]

A couple of Italian art historians claim to have found 100 sketches done by Caravaggio when he was an apprentice in Milan in the 1580s. Other Italian art historians say it’s all uno schifo. (Look it up. Figuratively it’s something you might be unhappy to find on your shoe…) I like the idea of getting [...]

He was a raging psycho, an uncontrollably lustful homosexual, and a bit of a bitch. Somehow he also managed to produce some of the most sensitive and innovative art ever painted, much of it clearly based on a sophisticated understanding of theology and optical science. For many art historians and almost all creative artists writing [...]

Largehearted Boy, the fabulous music and literature blog run by David Gutowski in New York, includes me in its illustrious series of “Book Notes” interviews. David asked me to pick the “soundtrack” to Mozart’s Last Aria, my historical mystery about the death of the great composer. Naturally much of the music is by Wolfgang. But [...]

A fabulous review on examiner.com for my historical mystery MOZART’S LAST ARIA. Lynn Farris writes: “I strongly recommend this book and feel that it would be an excellent book for book clubs to discuss as well.”