Venus on the Half-Shell assumed that Vonnegut wrote the book. This problem was solved by the book being reprinted under Farmer's by-line. A common element to this novel is the origin of many of the characters' and locations' names. Farmer "put in a lot of references to literature and fictional authors... Most of the alien names in Venus were formed by transposing the letters of English or non-English words." The title and paperback cover art are a reference to an Italian Renaissance tempera painting by Sandro Botticelli, "The Birth of Venus", which depicts the birth of the goddess Venus as her rising from the
The Botticelli Secret artist Sandro Botticelli. In 15th-century Italy, Luciana Vetra was young and beautiful, with long, golden hair. She was a full-time whore and a part-time model. When her best client asked her to pose as the goddess Flora for a painting, Luciana complied until the artist abruptly sends her away without payment. Luciana angrily took the unfinished painting, but someone was ready to kill her and people she knows to get the painting back. As friends and clients are murdered around her, Luciana turned to Guido della Torre, a novice at the monastery of Santa Croce. They fled together through the