Description
Almost twenty-five years after the infamous art heist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum-still the largest unsolved art theft in history-one of the stolen Degas paintings is delivered to the Boston studio of a young artist. Claire Roth has entered into a Faustian bargain with a powerful gallery owner by agreeing to forge the Degas in exchange for a one-woman show in his renowned gallery. But as she begins her work, she starts to suspect that this long-missing masterpiece-the very one that had been hanging at the Gardner for one hundred years-may itself be a forgery. The Art Forger is a thrilling novel about seeing-and not seeing-the secrets that lie beneath the canvas.
Boston Globe’s Best Crime Books of 2012
2012 NetGalley Pick
Kobo’s Best Fiction Ebooks of 2012
“The Art Forger is the real thing.” ―USAToday.com
“[A] nimble mystery.”―The New York Times Book Review
“Gripping.” ―O, The Oprah Magazine
“[A] highly entertaining literary thriller about fine art and foolish choices.” ―Parade
“Precise and exciting . . . Readers seeking an engaging novel about artists and art scandals will find “The Art Forger” rewarding for its skillful balance of brisk plotting, significant emotional depth and a multi-layered narration rich with a sense of moral consequence.” ―The Washington Post
“If Bridget Jones’s Diary and The Da Vinci Code had a love child, this would be it.” ―Elle (Reader’s Panel Reviewer)
“[Shapiro] has such interesting things to say about authenticity―in both art and love―that her novel becomes not just emotionally involving but addictive.” ―Entertainment Weekly
“Ingeniously and skillfully plotted.” ―The Huffington Post
“Warning: Don’t dig into this book if you have something to do . . . An addictive thriller.” ―Redbook
“An engaging tale about art, cupidity, and a Faustian bargain . . . Shapiro convincingly depicts the rarefied art world that lionizes a chosen few and ignores the talented, scrabbling outsiders on the fringe. Shapiro is adept, too, at showing the white-hot heat of an artist engaged in creating a painting. She knows art history, painting techniques, and how forgers have managed through the centuries to dupe buyers into paying for fakes . . . Inventive and entertaining.” ―The Boston Globe
