Synopses & Reviews
On March 18, 1990, thirteen works of art worth today over $500 million were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. It remains the largest unsolved art heist in history, and Claire Roth, a struggling young artist, is about to discover that there’s more to this crime than meets the eye.
Claire makes her living reproducing famous works of art for a popular online retailer. Desperate to improve her situation, she lets herself be lured into a Faustian bargain with Aiden Markel, a powerful gallery owner. She agrees to forge a painting — one of the Degas masterpieces stolen from the Gardner Museum — in exchange for a one-woman show in his renowned gallery. But when the long-missing Degas painting — the one that had been hanging for one hundred years at the Gardner — is delivered to Claire’s studio, she begins to suspect that it may itself be a forgery.
Claire’s search for the truth about the painting’s origins leads her into a labyrinth of deceit where secrets hidden since the late nineteenth century may be the only evidence that can now save her life. B. A. Shapiro’s razor-sharp writing and rich plot twists make The Art Forger an absorbing literary thriller that treats us to three centuries of forgers, art thieves, and obsessive collectors. it’s a dazzling novel about seeing — and not seeing — the secrets that lie beneath the canvas.
Review
"A clever, twisty novel about art, authenticity, love, and betrayal. B. A. Shapiro knows about Degas, and she knows about art theft and forgery, and she also knows how to tell a gripping story." Tom Perrotta
Review
"An engaging journey. Will not only keep you as entertained as any thriller but leave you with a new appreciation of how paintings are made, evaluated, and understood--not to mention how they're copied." Arthur Golden, bestselling author of Memoirs of a Geisha
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"Blazingly good. Shapiro drops you where you've never been before, into the whole, crackingly alive world of art galleries, art forgeries, and the unexpected recesses of the human heart. As original as a real Degas, it's also as unforgettable." Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Pictures of You
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"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
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"If Bridget Jones's Diary and The Da Vinci Code had a love child, this would be it." Elle
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"Ingeniously and skillfully plotted." The Huffington Post
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"A cleverly plotted art-world thriller/romance...convincingly researched, engaging storytelling. Intelligent entertainment." Kirkus Reviews
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"Filled with delightful twists, turns, and ruminations on what constitutes truth in art." Publishers Weekly
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"By page two of this novel, the reader is fully engrossed into the world of struggling artist Claire Roth, nicknamed 'The Great Pretender' who copies famous paintings for a website called Reproductions.com....A highly recommended debut that would be great for book discussion groups." Library Journal
Review
"Classy and pleasurably suspenseful...an entrancingly visual, historically rich, deliciously witty, sensuous, and smart tale of authenticity versus fakery in which Shapiro artfully turns a clever caper into a provocative meditation on what we value most." Booklist
About the Author
B. A. Shapiro lives in Boston and teaches fiction writing at Northeastern university. Author website: www.BAShapiroBooks.com.