Pantheon-Paris is a large bookstore in the heart of the Sorbonne district, and to some, a bookstore that can be considered a sacred shrine. But like most other magical centers, the bookstore can be vulnerable to defilement, and it is the employees of Pantheon-Paris, each under the burden of private ambitions, who bring their company to triumph or chaos. And, as it is difficult to categorize a book which enters several territories and genres, ARTIFICIAL FIRE is a story about art, poetry, drama, travel. Along the way, readers will meet Picasso, Rachmaninov, classical Japanese playwrights, 4, 000 year old advisors to ancient and modern pharaohs, confront the mysteries of the Alexandrian lighthouse and a mystery surrounding the disappearence of the weapon Hemmingway used to end his life....