The book of stolen tales

the long version

"John Madison travels to London to purchase at auction a rare seventeenth-century Italian book of fairy tales for an anonymous client. Madison is warned of the book's malevolent history, but before he can deliver it to the buyer, he is robbed by a mysterious man claiming to be the book's author. When his client disappears and the book's provenance is questioned, Madison must immerse himself in the strange world of eccentric European aristocracy and rare book collectors. As the dark origins of familiar fairy tales appear to come to life around him, Madison discovers that a well-loved children's story contains a necromancer's spell and points to the source of a deadly Mesopotamian plague."--Provided by publisher