German fiction: Der Alchemist von Venedig

[Paul Ferguson]

"In 1689, master builder Fabrizio Mansani saves his brother, who has been sentenced to death on a false charge, and wants to leave Venice. But his deed did not go unobserved and so he was forced by the chamberlain Ducatini, desperate because of the empty state coffers, to help him in a deceptive manoeuvre. Officially, Leibniz and Newton are to devote themselves to building an observatory - larger than that of the Vatican. But Newton's main task is to produce gold for Venice and the chamberlain threatens to extradite him to Rome as a sorcerer if he refuses ..."

https://www.amazon.de/Alchemist-von-Vene...B0C3R6X4X5