Masks

I started a new book today.  It is set in 1725.  I thought the first paragraph worthy of quoting in my blog today.

"In a Northern notch of the Adriatic Sea, beyond allegiance to Byzantium or Rome, a thousand-year-old empire was sinking.  No one noticed her descent, disguised by centuries of wealth and reputation, like her citizens, living each day behind their carnevale masks.   In the years before the republic fell, this was the Venetian way;  to make a mystery of everything, to obscure identity and life,  never to look too closely at what lay underneath."

Sound familiar?