“Scared? Me…….”I said faking disbelief to my colleague as I fastened my harness and tucked my hair under my helmet. “It takes more than that thing,” I added nodding over at what looked like a huge metallic spider “to scare a Murphy,” – or maybe I should say, a Murfi, which is the way the Florentines call me.

The whole idea of standing on a wobbling metal cradle, powered by an arachnid crane and taken 100 meters above piazza della Signoria sounded like an exciting enterprise for a wet Monday morning. Our mission was to inspect the state of conservation of the facade of Palazzo Vecchio; a mission which I took with certain nonchalance. Little did I know that nonchalance would soon become a terrifying and totally irrational fear for my life. It’s hard to negotiate with Mr Panic-get-me-out-of-here-now! before-I-call-the-fire-brigade, especially when you have agreed to spend six hours hovering before Palazzo Vecchio, scalpel and syringes in hand.

As the cradle began to levitate and my nonchalance began to plummet, I did what most people try to do when confronted with irrational fears, I began fiddling with things. I checked my harness, I moved the carabiner, I fumbled with my helmet and in the process I accidently paused the action cam, which is why the posted video comes to a sudden stop. Sorry for that.

All this to say that whilst I was reaching the heavens of Piazza della Signoria, my publisher Jason Beacon phoned with news. The Restorer has gone from pulp to pixel. You can now download it directly into your Kindle device for €3,88 at Amazon.com. For those of you who don’t have a kindle, you can download a virtual one onto your computer or mobile devices by clicking here.

A big thanks to all of you who have posted your thoughts in this blog and have and continue to encourage me through the vertiginous world of publishing.

PS – The Florentine has just published an article on The Restorer. If you want to read it click here. The article was written by Oonagh Stransky with whom I had great fun. Thanks Oonagh.