Villa Dolores is the moving story of the making of a painter.

After Rafael Sinclair Mahdavi’s birth in Mexico his American mother and Iranian father moved to Mallorca. The author’s island childhood was idyllic yet also crossed with violence and death. He later survived the brutality of European boarding schools. In Madrid his discovery of the paintings at the Prado became central to his coming of age as a painter, and as an exile from nowhere and everywhere. In Vienna when told he was about to die, he rejected the offer of last rites. Recovering in the Alps he lived a dramatic love affair. His educational odyssey ended when he returned to Villa Dolores for a last good bye.

The story ends as he is about to leave for America at the start of the nineteen sixties.

“Original, cosmopolitan, perceptive, these recollections make for a riveting read.”
Rory Brennan, poet and literary journalist

“Extraordinary… The story still needs telling, and you spare nothing in the evidence you give.”
Peter Abbs, author of Against the Flow

Design: Peter Macken Dialogo Design

Cover Photo: Rafael Sinclair Mahdavi

For more information about the author please visit www.rafaelmahdabvi.com

Rafael Sinclair Mahdavi

Books