<b>Jim Williams</b> first hit the news when his early novels had the uncanny knack of coming true. <i>The Hitler Diaries</i> was published nine months before the celebrated forgery came out in 1983. <i>Farewell to Russia</i> dealt with a nuclear disaster in the Soviet Union months before the Chernobyl disaster. <i>Lara's Child</i>, his sequel to <i>Doctor Zhivago</i>, provoked an international literary scandal and led to his being a guest speaker at the Cheltenham Festival. <i>Scherzo</i>, a witty and elegant mystery set in eighteenth century Venice, was nominated for the Booker Prize. All of his fiction has been published internationally. <i>Tango in Madeira</i> is his eleventh novel.