Flap Copy: On March 18, 1990, thirteen works of art today worth 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.

Making a living reproducing famous artworks for a popular online retailer and desperate to improve her situation, Claire is lured into a Faustian bargain with Aiden Markel, a powerful gallery owner. She agrees to forge a painting—a Degas masterpiece stolen from the Gardner Museum—in exchange for a one-woman show in his renowned gallery. But when that very same long-missing Degas painting is delivered to Claire’s studio, she begins to suspect that it may itself be a forgery.

Her desperate search for the truth leads Claire into a labyrinth of deceit where secrets hidden since the late nineteenth century may be the only evidence that can now save her life.

Review: The Art Forger reads like a starving artist’s version of The Thomas Crowne Affair. Intrigue, deceit, art, high stakes – what’s not to love?

Full of details about both original and forged artwork, along with the politics of the art world, The Art Forger never feels forced or “teachy” but instead imparts fascinating information while spinning a great tale.

The story is riveting – I tried to slow myself down on this one but ultimately couldn’t do it; I just kept turning the pages! The characters are fully fleshed out, and even the paintings become characters, described with such intensity that their luminosity leaves the visual world and enters the textual one.

Source: I received a free copy of this book from Algonquin.