I am following in the footsteps of a great jewel. It has been in Istanbul at least once. A stone from the artefact was sold here three centuries ago, when the shoulder-knot itself was already as old as that again. And great jewels have a way of returning to their past. Anywhere they have been - anyone they have been with - is somewhere they can be again. I sit in the place which is not mine and listen to the slow shock, shock of the ceiling fan. Ismet switches off the scales. 'Pretty little things, aren't they? I'll give you the best price I can.' The Love of Stones follows three lives all linked by one precious jewel. Katharine Sterne searches the goldsmiths' quarters and hidden archives of contemporary London. Tokyo, and Istanbul, following the trail of a long-lost precious brooch of rubies, diamonds, and pearls once worn by Queen Elizabeth I. Two hundred years earlier, a pair of Iraqi Jewish brothers travel to London, their fortunes made by an unearthed jar of mysterious and priceless stones. An epic story spanning two continents and six centuries, The Love of Stones follows three very different people, each consumed by the same desire. At the heart of their quests is the Three Brethren, a legendary jewel that binds them together in an irresistible narrative. Author Biography: Tobias Hill has published three award-winning collections of poetry; a short story collection, Skin, which won the 1998 PEN/Macmillan Award for fiction and was shortlisted for the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, and a novel, Underground in 1999. He lives in England, where his is a Visiting Fellow at Sussex University.