The Art Forger by B. A. Shapiro

 

The Art Forger by B. A Shapiro 

Read by Xe Sands

10 hours

Published October 2012 by Algonquin Books

Publisher's Summary: 

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.

My Thoughts:

Claire Roth is a woman who feels that she has been done wrong by the art world. She's not wrong, which we'll gradually learn. But she uses this as an excuse for agreeing to forge a copy of one of the pieces of art that was stolen, solely on the basis that the man who hires her insists that he will give the original back to the museum once the copy is sold to a shady character who doesn't deserve to have the original. In exchange for that, Claire will get to have her chance to finally become the artist she might have been if she had not been so blinded by her love of a man many years ago. 

So she agrees and almost immediately falls in love with Aiden. Despite the fact that he's clearly involved with criminals. Despite the fact that his love of the artwork he owns prevents him from being willing to part with any of it, even when he admits to having financial problems. But he's promised her that he's made sure that she can never be implicated, going so far as to say to her that the painting that he's brought her to copy is, in fact, a copy itself, thereby making her simply someone who is copying a copy. That's all she knows about the deal; the rest is secret. But that's since she's keeping a secret of her own that will come into play later. What could possibly go wrong in a relationship built on secrets? 

Here are the things that I had issues with in this book: 

1. Claire being so gullible a second time. 
2. The interspersed chapters that are letters from Isabella Stewart Gardner which never come to light for the characters in the book. They are merely a way to set up a revel late in the book. 
3. Claire volunteers at a youth prison, teaching art. The point of this storyline appears to be to show us that Claire is, deep down, a good person who is terrified of being locked up. It also explains why she becomes convinced that the painting Aiden has brought her is a forger itself. Seemed to me all of this could have been done in a way that didn't introduce yet another storyline into a story that already had enough going on. 

Here are the things that I enjoyed about the book: 

1. Xe Sands reading of the book. 
2. For some reason, the theft of the paintings from the Stewart Gardner museum has always fascinated me, so I enjoyed reading about the museum and the theft. 
3. Learning about the techniques that Claire and other artists use. 
4. I did like all of the twists and turns the book took and the way only Claire could have solved the mystery of where the original work was hidden. 

Would I read another of Shapiro's work, despite having issues with it? I would - it was a quick read that I found entertaining enough and it looks like I'd get a chance to learn more about the art world if I read more by her. 

 

Life: It Goes On - June 9

Happy Sunday! As I type, I'm watching out the window for a truck to arrive with my new washing machine. Mine decided it would tumble long enough to fill with water and it was fine with draining and spinning. It was just all of that stuff in the middle that it didn't want to do any more...like actually wash the clothes. I'd much rather be spending this money on a vacation! 

Last Week I: 

Listened To: I finished Lynn Painter's The Love Wager and started Madeline Martin's The Keeper of Hidden Books. Quite the change in mood from one to the other!

Watched: Lots of college baseball (again), game one of the NBA finals, and Jerry Seinfeld's latest movie, Unfrosted (a little stupid, but also fun with a lot of sly things thrown in and Hugh Grant was hilarious). 

Read: I finished Julia Alvarez's latest, The Cemetery of Untold Stories and started Kris Carr's I'm Not A Mourning Person: Braving Loss, Grief, and the Big Messy Emotions That Happen When Life Falls Apart. 

Made: Ravioli - both a spinach/ricotta and a sweet corn/spinach/ricotta type, chicken nugget salads, and a chicken pasta dish. 

The way you dress for a matinee
when you're following it up with
a trip to an arts festival. 

Enjoyed: Yesterday BG, Mini-him, Miss C and I went to a matinee performance (matinee because I was more concerned about getting seats where I wanted them than to pay attention to the fact that it wasn't an evening performance!) of Moulin Rouge, which we all thought was excellent. We followed that up with a trip to the Omaha Summer Arts Festival where we ate African, Mexican, Southern, and Indian food and came home with some art purchases. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This Week I’m:  

Planning: This week should be quieter so I'm hoping to get caught up on paperwork, do some work in the basement, and get some extra reading time in because I have so many books I need to get read. 

Thinking About: Father's Day and what to get for my dad and my hubby. 

Feeling: Like a different woman. Got my hair done on Thursday and we went lighter than I have been in years (gotta move that way to make the grays not so obvious quite so soon!). 

Looking forward to: Evenings on the patio since we'll finally have evenings that are free this week when it's not raining. 

Question of the week: Have you seen the theatrical production of Moulin Rouge? 

Mini-Reviews: December 2023

I have been reading (some, at least), but I sure haven't been posting reviews! And this week totally got away from me when I got sick with norovirus just before Christmas - it took me out for five days! To make sure I get reviews posted in the year that I read the books, I'm going to bust out mini-reviews for the books I've read and haven't reviewed yet this year. 

Darling Girl: A Novel of Peter Pan by Liz Michalski

352 pages

Published May 2022 by Penguin Publishing Group

Source: discovered when the author commented on one of my Instagram posts

Publisher's Summary: 

Life is looking up for Holly Darling, granddaughter of Wendy—yes, that Wendy. That is, until she gets a call that her daughter, Eden, who has been in a coma for nearly a decade, has gone missing from the estate where she’s been long tucked away. And, worst of all, Holly knows who must be responsible: Peter Pan, who is not only very real, but very dangerous. Holly is desperate to find Eden and protect her son, Jack, from a terrible web of family secrets before she loses both her children. And yet she has no one to turn to—her mother, Jane, is the only other person in the world who knows that Peter is more than a story, but she refuses to accept that he is not the hero'she’s always imagined. 

Darling Girl brings all the magic of the classic Peter Pan story to the present, while also exploring the dark underpinnings of fairy tales, grief, aging, sacrifice, motherhood, and just how far we will go to protect those we love.

My Thoughts: 

It's not uncommon for an author to comment on an Instagram post, likely in search of finding a reader interested in taking a look at their work. I don't usually follow up but this time I did and was intrigued. By a coincidence, I also happened to be reading the next book at the same time. Two books inspired by classics, both where our perceptions from the classic are turned upside down. 

You'll have to accept a big of magic (but then you know that going in, of course), that you might never understand some of the "science," and that Eden was kept a secret from everyone for years. The sense of urgency I would have expected was somewhat missing. But I really enjoyed the way Michalski incorporated the key characters from the classic and picked up from that storyline to craft her own work. It was a good escape from heavy reads while also touching on heavy themes. I enjoyed it a lot. Thanks for commenting on my post, Ms. Michalski, and introducing me to your novel!

The Fairytale Life of Dorothy Gale by Virginia Kantra

384 pages

Published December 2023 by Penguin Publishing Group

Source: my copy courtesy of the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review

Publisher's Summary: 

Dorothy “Dee” Gale is searching for a place to belong. After their globe-trotting mother’s death, Dee and her sister Toni settled with Uncle Henry and Aunt Em in Kansas, where Dee attends graduate school. But when Dee’s relationship with a faculty member, a bestselling novelist, ends in heartbreak and humiliation, she’s caught in a tornado of negative publicity. Unable to face her colleagues—or her former lover—Dee applies to the writing program at Trinity College Dublin. Dee’s journey to Ireland leads her to new companions: seemingly brainless Sam Clery—who dropped out of college and now runs a newsagent’s shop—is charming and hot, in a dissolute, Irish poet kind of way; allegedly heartless Tim Woodman—who stiffly refused to take back his ex-fiancée—seems stuck in his past; and fiercely loyal Reeti Kaur, who longs for the courage to tell her parents she wants to teach underprivileged girls rather than work in the family business. 

In a year of opportunities and changes, love and loss, Dee is mentored by powerful women in the writing program, challenging her to see herself and her work with new eyes. With her friends, Dee finds the confidence to confront her biggest fears—including her intimidating graduate advisor, who may not be so wicked after all. Faced with a choice with far-reaching consequences, Dee must apply the lessons she’s learned along the way about making a family, finding a home...and recognizing the power that’s been inside her all along.

My Thoughts: 

This one takes the original classic and moves it into the twenty-first century. Dorothy is now "Dee"; sister Toni's nickname is "Toto." After they're orphaned, they move in with their aunt and uncle on a Kansas farm, where they're provided everything they need but never feel the warmth of love Dee craves. So when that tornado of bad publicity, instead of moving home, she travels to Ireland (Oz). There she meets her scarecrow, tin man, lion, Glenda, and a wicked witch. 

This being not just a retelling of The Wizard of Oz, but also a romance, you know that everything will end well. The fun is all in the getting there, in seeing each of the characters get what they want (or, in at least a couple of cases, what they deserve), in seeing the ways that Kantra works in so many parts of the classic while still telling a story that sounds contemporary. It was just what I needed when I read it - fun, an ending I wanted, and all of the familiarity I seemed to have craved. 

Wellness by Nathan Hill

Read by Ari Flakes

18 hours, 56 minutes

Published September 2023 by Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

Publisher's Summary: 

When Jack and Elizabeth meet as college students in the gritty '90s Chicago art scene, the two quickly join forces and hold on tight, each eager to claim a place in the thriving underground scene with an appreciative kindred spirit. Fast-forward twenty years to suburban married life, and alongside the challenges of parenting, they encounter the often-baffling pursuits of health and happiness from polyamorous would-be suitors to home-renovation hysteria. For the first time, Jack and Elizabeth struggle to recognize each other, and the no-longer-youthful dreamers are forced to face their demons, from unfulfilled career ambitions to childhood memories of their own dysfunctional families. In the process, Jack and Elizabeth must undertake separate, personal excavations, or risk losing the best thing in their lives: each other.

My Thoughts: 

I'm seeing this one on lots of "best of 2023" lists and it was an Oprah's Book Club pick. And I get that there's a lot of meat to this one, a lot to think about, a lot to discuss. But it's so, so long and reading a book about a marriage falling apart was just not the thing I wanted to read when I was listening to this one. Maybe if I had read this one at a different time of year, instead of a time of year when I was trying to work so hard to keep in the spirit of the season, I would have enjoyed it more. Publisher's Weekly called this one Dickensian and it certainly did have that feel; things just kept getting worse and worse. It also says that this book never loses sight of its humanity; but, for me, it felt more like Hill was interested in getting his ideas out into the world. Hill asks the questions: do the narratives we craft give our lives meaning, do they harm us or do they help us? I don't know. What I do know was that I felt like both Jack and Elizabeth decided it was easier to give up because things didn't turn out easy and the way they expected. And I found that far too frustrating to enjoy the book.

All The Beauty In The World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me by Patrick Bringley

240 pages

Published February 2023 by Simon and Schuster

Publisher's Summary:

Millions of people climb the grand marble staircase to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art every year. But only a select few have unrestricted access to every nook and cranny. They’re the guards who roam unobtrusively in dark blue suits, keeping a watchful eye on the two million square foot treasure house. 

Caught up in his glamorous fledgling career at The New Yorker, Patrick Bringley never thought he’d be one of them. Then his older brother was diagnosed with fatal cancer and he found himself needing to escape the mundane clamor of daily life. So he quit The New Yorker and sought solace in the most beautiful place he knew. To his surprise and the reader’s delight, this temporary refuge becomes Bringley’s home away from home for a decade. We follow him as he guards delicate treasures from Egypt to Rome, strolls the labyrinths beneath the galleries, wears out nine pairs of company shoes, and marvels at the beautiful works in his care. 

Bringley enters the museum as a ghost, silent and almost invisible, but soon finds his voice and his tribe: the artworks and their creators and the lively subculture of museum guards—a gorgeous mosaic of artists, musicians, blue-collar stalwarts, immigrants, cutups, and dreamers. As his bonds with his colleagues and the art grow, he comes to understand how fortunate he is to be walled off in this little world, and how much it resembles the best aspects of the larger world to which he gradually, gratefully returns. In the tradition of classic workplace memoirs like Lab Girl and Working Stiff, All The Beauty in the World is a surprising, inspiring portrait of a great museum, its hidden treasures, and the people who make it tick, by one of its most intimate observers.

My Thoughts: 

Now this one, at a relatively slim 240 pages, caught my interest immediately, and held it tight. Bringley does a lovely job of weaving together the circumstances of his life that brought him to the Met and how those circumstances made it the perfect job for him in that moment. 

Bringley has a tremendous appreciation of the works housed in the met and had me looking up works of art constantly. I have always regretted that the hubby and I had devoted so little time to the Met when we went there while in NYC on our honeymoon (seriously, I saw the Brooklyn Bridge, I could have skipped walking on it) and now I'm feeling like a trip to NYC just to spend a couple of days there might need to be scheduled. 

This is a lovely book filled with appreciation for the working people of the Met and the wonders displayed there. It's also a lovely book about how one man dealt with grief. I highly recommend this one. 

Horse by Geraldine Brooks

Horse by Geraldine Brooks

14 hours, 6 minutes

Read by James Fouhey, Lisa Flanagan, Graham Halstead, Katherine Littrell

Published June 2022 by Penguin Publishing Group

Publisher's Summary: 

Kentucky, 1850. An enslaved groom named Jarret and a bay foal forge a bond of understanding that will carry the horse to record-setting victories across the South. When the nation erupts in civil war, an itinerant young artist who has made his name on paintings of the racehorse takes up arms for the Union. On a perilous night, he reunites with the stallion and his groom, very far from the glamor of any racetrack.  

New York City, 1954. Martha Jackson, a gallery owner celebrated for taking risks on edgy contemporary painters, becomes obsessed with a nineteenth-century equestrian oil painting of mysterious provenance.

Washington, DC, 2019. Jess, a Smithsonian scientist from Australia, and Theo, a Nigerian-American art historian, find themselves unexpectedly connected through their shared interest in the horse—one studying the stallion’s bones for clues to his power and endurance, the other uncovering the lost history of the unsung Black horsemen who were critical to his racing success. 

Based on the remarkable true story of the record-breaking thoroughbred Lexington, Horse is a novel of art and science, love and obsession, and our unfinished reckoning with racism.

The only known photo of
Lexington

My Thoughts: 

I've long been a fan of Brooks, first discovering her work when I read People of the Book before I started this blog. Brooks does have something of a pattern, which, to be honest, doesn't always work for me. There are (nearly) always dual time lines (here there are actually three). No matter how well the modern time line works, it always pales (for me) in comparison to the historical time line. Perhaps that's because Brooks' stories nearly always begin with some nugget from history that piques her interest and starts her down her research journey. 

Here that start was learning about Lexington, a horse so fast that the modern-day stopwatch was invented to be able to time him and who sired 236 winners, including Preakness from whom the now-famous race is named. And then he disappeared from history, his articulated skeleton languishing for years in a Smithsonian attic. In her research, Brooks also discovered that Lexington had been painted by several painters, including a lost painting that was referenced to include "black Jarrett." Brooks also discovered the crucial part that enslaved persons played in antebellum horse racing - they were grooms, trainers, and jockeys. 

Painting of Lexington by Thomas Scott

It is Jarrett, and his relationship with Lexington, that is the true heart of this book, the two sold together from one rich man to another. Lexington isn't the only historical figure that Brooks includes in the book - each of Lexington's owners, his first trainer, abolitionist politician Cassius Marcellus Clay, and itinerate painter Thomas Scott are also featured in the book. 

Jarrett, and the role enslaved persons played in horse racing, launched Brooks' book; but as she wrote, Brooks discovered that her story needed to be about race, not just racing. How she fared with this is the subject of some debate; a white woman writing the stories of two young black men is a risk, one Brooks was bold enough to point out in the book. Here again, I felt like she addressed this situation better in the historical parts of the book and was disappointed in how she finished out the modern story line in regard to this. 

Brooks is always strongest when she's using her research to guide her stories; her books are always filled with details but rarely to the point where I feel like she's trying to cram in everything she's learned. Here we learn about how scientists clean bones, how skeletons can reveal so much about an animals life, about art preservation, and, most of all about horse racing in a time when horse racing was a much different sport. 

The book is told from several points of view, fleshing out the full history of the characters and their stories, including the only first person narrative told as diary entries made by Scott.  As with the time lines, some of the points of view are stronger than others. The audiobook uses multiple readers for the different points of view and only one really didn't work for me; otherwise, the readers served to enhance the reading experience for me.

Is it sometimes a bumpy ride? Yes. But despite the flaws, I really enjoyed this one; Brooks' strengths far outweigh the faults in my opinion. And, as always with her books, Brooks has been doing some digging on my own to learn more about the subjects she's presented and the historical figures she's included. I'm always a fan of a book that makes me want to keep learning. 

A Single Thread by Tracy Chevalier

A Single Thread by Tracy Chevalier
Read by Fenella Woolgar
Published September 2019 by Penguin Publishing Group
Source: audiobook checked out from my local library

Publisher’s Summary:
1932. After the Great War took both her beloved brother and her fiancé, Violet Speedwell has become a "surplus woman," one of a generation doomed to a life of spinsterhood after the war killed so many young men. Yet Violet cannot reconcile herself to a life spent caring for her grieving, embittered mother. After countless meals of boiled eggs and dry toast, she saves enough to move out of her mother's place and into the town of Winchester, home to one of England's grandest cathedrals. There, Violet is drawn into a society of broderers—women who embroider kneelers for the Cathedral, carrying on a centuries-long tradition of bringing comfort to worshippers.

Violet finds support and community in the group, fulfillment in the work they create, and even a
growing friendship with the vivacious Gilda. But when forces threaten her new independence and
another war appears on the horizon, Violet must fight to put down roots in a place where women
aren't expected to grow.

Told in Chevalier's glorious prose, A Single Thread is a timeless story of friendship, love, and a woman crafting her own life.

My Thoughts:
Which comes first for Chevalier – the idea for a new story about a woman or the discovery of a subject she’s dying to research? She never seems to run out of either the story ideas or the interesting subjects to explore and she always finds a way to make center the story around women, even when the historical focus has been on the men (as with Griet in The Girl With The Pearl Earring, a book about the girl who inspired the painter Johannes Vermeer).

In A Single Thread, the history and the art are less well known. And while there really was a Louisa Pesel, who lead the broderers who made the embroidered kneelers, cushions, and other accessories for Winchester Cathedral, this is not her story. Instead it is the story of a group of women, the broderers, who form their own kind of tapestry as their lives are bond together. It's also the story of a group of women who became known as the "surplus" women and the story of single women in the 1930's, a time when single women were looked down on once they reached a certain age, and the story of women who had to hide in plain sight because of their sexuality. At the heart of the book lies Violet, a woman struggling with grief from the deaths of her father, brother, and fiancé and trying to find her place in a world where nothing more is expected of her than to take care of her aging, unpleasant mother.

WhenViolet can't take it any longer, she moves away, taking a job as a typist, a job that pays so little that she can't even afford to eat hot meals and where her coworkers are vapid girls who talk of nothing but finding a husband. It's a real measure of how miserable life with her mother was when this life is better than that was. Then one day she chances upon a church service recognizing the latest batch of completed embroidered works and meets a young women who will help her find a place among the group of broderers. It's just the thing that Violet needs to help her come back to life and find her place in the world. Soon she's found a strength she never knew she was capable of and a group of women to support her.

It's a quiet book (one reviewer called it "gentle"), heavy on the details of the embroidery (as well, a the music and skill behind the ringing of the bells in the Cathedral) and events unfold slowly. I listened to it and Fenella Woolgar does a lovely job; I can't imagine it's a book someone would find themselves unable to put down in print, though. Yet, I can also see it being exactly the kind of book that might be adapted into a movie because Chevalier is so marvelous and bringing her subjects to life. The colors and textures of the embroidery, the scale and majesty of the Cathedral, the mechanics of ringing the bells, and the visible circumstances of her characters' lives. There is one character and story line I felt could have been left out of the book entirely and nothing would have been lost; in fact, I might well have enjoyed it more without the threat that storyline carried. It's not a book for everyone, particularly those that enjoy a more fast-paced book, but I think Chevalier's fans will have been pleased with this one.

Life: It Goes On - June 10

Y'all know when I've actually had a weekend with plans when this doesn't show up until Monday, right?! Mini-me and Ms. S were in Omaha this weekend and my parents also came in yesterday. We had such a good visit and it felt so good to have them home. We ate too much, celebrated Ms. S's birthday (some of her gifts were too fragile and too irreplaceable to be shipped), and talked and laughed so much. They went home with a couple of pieces of furniture, the china set they'd chosen, and Mini-me "checked out" nine books from my "library."

Last Week I:

Listened To: Meg Wolitzer's The Female Persuasion. I always have mixed feelings about Wolitzer's books but this one got such great reviews that I thought I'd give it a try. Guess what? I'm having mixed feelings about it. It'll expire in three days so we'll see if these last few hours suddenly wow me.

Watched: Lots of NCAA baseball.

Read: I'm reading Timothy Schaffert's Swan Gondola and really enjoying it.

Made: Ham and Swiss, beef and white cheddar, and portabello mushroom sliders for dinner on Sunday along with strawberry rhubarb pie since it was, apparently, strawberry rhubarb pie day.

Gallery pictures taken at the KANEKO gallery in Omaha

Enjoyed: Having my family back together, going to see the musical Ragtime with my book club on Wednesday, and going to a gallery opening (it was all about using repurposed objects) with friends on Friday.

This Week I’m: 

Planning: On putting my basement back together. After all of the work we had done on it, we discovered that we had gotten water in it after the last storm (the first time we've had water in our basement in 23 years). Right now there is an industrial dehumidifier working it's magic down there. We were fortunate in that there wasn't much water in and nothing got damaged - it's just a pain to deal with.

Thinking About: Going to my 40th class reunion this weekend. There will be some people there that I'd really like to see; but otherwise, walking into a venue filled with people I don't really know anymore (and many I didn't really know 40 years ago), is so out of my comfort zone. I'm on the fence right now and didn't sign up to be at any of the meals.

Feeling: Happy.

Looking forward to: As much as I enjoyed all of the things we did last week, I'm looking forward to a quiet week this week.

Question of the week: What can you do with radishes besides put them on a veggie tray or in a salad? Mini-me brought us radishes, new potatoes, asparagus, and lots of lettuce from the organic farm he is working on this year and while I can imagine all kinds of ways we will use everything else, I'm at a loss as to how we'll consume a dozen enormous radishes! Can they be pickled?

A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline

A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline
Published February 2017 by William Morrow
Source: my copy courtesy of the publisher and TLC Book Tours in exchange for an honest review

Publisher's Summary:
“Later he told me that he’d been afraid to show me the painting. He thought I wouldn’t like the way he portrayed me: dragging myself across the field, fingers clutching dirt, my legs twisted behind. The arid moonscape of wheatgrass and timothy. That dilapidated house in the distance, looming up like a secret that won’t stay hidden.”

To Christina Olson, the entire world was her family’s remote farm in the small coastal town of Cushing, Maine. Born in the home her family had lived in for generations, and increasingly incapacitated by illness, Christina seemed destined for a small life. Instead, for more than twenty years, she was host and inspiration for the artist Andrew Wyeth, and became the subject of one of the best known American paintings of the twentieth century.

As she did in her beloved smash bestseller Orphan Train, Christina Baker Kline interweaves fact and fiction in a powerful novel that illuminates a little-known part of America’s history. Bringing into focus the flesh-and-blood woman behind the portrait, she vividly imagines the life of a woman with a complicated relationship to her family and her past, and a special bond with one of our greatest modern artists.


My Thoughts: 

A print of Andrew Wyeth's Christina's World hung in my parents house for many years. It has been on loan to my for many years now so when TLC Book Tours contacted me about reviewing a book based on the painting, I didn't hesitate to say "yes!" I may be the only person who has not yet read Baker Kline's Orphan Train, but I've read enough praise of it to feel that she would do justice to a story I've been building in my head for years. Who is this woman who appears so alone in the world? 

A Piece of The World more than lived up to my expectations. I thoroughly enjoyed this blending of the history of Wyeth's process, Olson's family history and her own sad life, and fiction. In the painting, Wyeth has managed to convey both a wide open world and Christina's own very limited life.  Baker Kline is equally adept at conveying that feeling. Her Christina is a woman who has watched her own hopes be squashed, had her chance at love lost, and had to deal with debilitating impairment and a family who expects her to carry their burdens despite her own. 

Kirkus Reviews says the book is "thin on plot." I feel that reviewer missed the point of the story. This is not a plot-driven novel. This is a novel about a character and how her life brought her to the place where she became the inspiration for one of modern art's great masterpieces. It makes that painting live. But it also leaves, for me, the mystery.

Thanks so much to the ladies at TLC Book Tours for including me on this tour. I can't wait to hand this book over to my parents. For other opinions, check out the full tour.  

Christina Baker Kline is the author of five novels. She lives outside of New York City and on the coast of Maine. Find out more about Kline at her website, connect with her on Facebook, and follow her on Twitter.

To learn more about Andrew Wyeth, check out his official website.

The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean

The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean
Published March 2006 by HarperCollins Publishers
Source: bought for my Nook

Publisher's Summary:
In the fall of 1941, the German army approached the outskirts of Leningrad, signaling the beginning of what would become a long and torturous siege. During the ensuing months, the city's inhabitants would brave starvation and the bitter cold, all while fending off the constant German onslaught.

Marina, then a tour guide at the Hermitage Museum, along with other staff members, was instructed to take down the museum's priceless masterpieces for safekeeping, yet leave the frames hanging empty on the walls - a symbol of the artworks' eventual return. To hold on to sanity when the Luftwaffe's bombs began to fall, she burned to memory, brushstroke by brushstroke, these exquisite artworks: the nude figures of women, the angels, the serene Madonnas that had so shortly before gazed down upon her. She used them to furnish a "memory palace," a personal Hermitage in her mind to which she retreated to escape terror, hunger, and encroaching death. A refuge that would stay buried deep within her, until she needed it once more.

Moving back and forth in time between the Soviet Union and contemporary America, The Madonnas of Leningrad is a portrait of war and remembrance, of the power of love, memory, and art to offer beauty, grace, and hope in the face of overwhelming despair.


My Thoughts:
Sixty years after that devastating 900 day siege, the memory Marina relied on in order to survive has betrayed her. As her family prepares for the wedding of her granddaughter, Marina is struggling to remember who is even getting married as Alzheimer's begins to tighten its grip on her mind.

Dean, in her debut novel,  moves back and forth in time as Marina, again and again, slips into her past. Marina's battle to stay in the present is beautifully written, although the story does get bogged down when Dean moves into Marina's daughter's problems. Likewise, Dean paints a vivid picture of life in a world devoid of hope as the people of Leningrad fight to survive but the story again gets bogged down in overly vivid details of the paintings Marina is committing to memory.

The Hermitage during the siege of Leningrad

It's always a plus for me when a book pushes me to look for more information on a subject and this one had me not only researching the siege of Leningrad but also the paintings that Dean highlighted.

Fairy Tale Friday - Snow White - The Brothers Grimm Illustrastions by Camille Rose Garcia

Snow White - The Brothers Grimm, illustration by Camille Rose Garcia
Published February 2012 by HarperCollins Publishers
Source: fairy tale book on clearance? You know I bought this one!

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the fairest one of all?"

You all know at least the story - wicked stepmother, beautiful girl seeking asylum with a group of dwarfs, wicked stepmother tries to kill girl, handsome prince saves girl. What sets this one apart are the illustrations by Camille Rose Garcia, he fantastic colors and the simply superb text. It is a visual masterpiece. The publishers have combined a variety of sizes, fonts and backgrounds so that even the pages without illustrations are beautiful.

Camille Rose Garcia

Garcia's characters are a little creepy, with their oversized, triangular heads and sharp features - it's one of her trademarks. I must admit that it was a little difficult to imagine the mirror finding either the wicked stepmother or this version of Snow White as the fairest of them all!

According to her website, Garcia's "cartoon characters in wasteland fairy tales are critical commentaries on the failures of capitalist utopias, blending nostalgic pop culture references with a satirical slant on modern society." She sites as her inspiration early works by Disney and Max Fleisher. Garcia has also illustrated Alice's Adventures In Wonderland for HarperCollins Publishers.

Camille Rose Garcia

Fairy Tale Fridays - A Fresh Take

My friend Teri and I have a lot in common.

Not really. She's an East Coast city chick; I'm a Midwest suburban gal. I'd like to be creative; Teri really is creative, very creative. Two things we do have in common: we both love books and we both love fairy tales.

Teri, who blogs at Quinceberry: My Artful Life, creates the most marvelous books out of papers, fabric, lace, all manner of media and all kinds of interesting embellishments. Her latest creation is this fairy tale book. All of the artwork is Teri's creation and she's also given her own spin to some classic tales. How fun is this version of Rapunzel?! I just had to share this with you.

To learn more about the inspiration behind this book, and to see more of the pages, check out Quinceberry: My Artful Life. 

Fairy Tale Fridays - The Art

One of the things I've enjoyed since I started Fairy Tale Fridays is looking for the artwork to include in my posts. I've stuck to the traditional drawings, largely because I wasn't finding a lot of more modern interpretations. Thanks to my niece, I've discovered a page on Stumble! that features minimalist artwork for fairy tales. I'm liking these almost as much as my beloved Arthur Rackham works.

Rackham's work is so traditional, so appropriate to the feel of the fairy tales, that it seems that it must be hundreds of years old as well. But Rackham (9/9/1867 - 9/6/1939) didn't even begin studying art until 1885 and the works for which he is famous were not created until after the turn of the century. By that time, Rackham had developed his own technique, explaining why his pieces are so instantly recognizable.

Other well-known fairy tale artists are Maxfield Parrish, Gustave Dore, and Edmund Dulac. While Dore's works are literally and figuratively darker, Parrish and Dulac's works are all about color.

But Lisa, you as, were there no women illustrators? Why, yes there were; thank you for asking. Among the better known female illustrators of fairy tales are Margaret Ely Webb, Jessie M. King (a Scotswoman whose work was influenced by the Art Nouveau movement), Helen Stratton, Jennie Harbour, and Anne Anderson (whose work was a bit more stylized).

Jessie Wilcox Smith is, perhaps, the most famous of the female fairy tale illustrators.Smith, a contemporary of Rackham's, was as well known for her magazine covers as she was for her children's book illustrations and her illustrations for Charles Kingsley's The Water Babies (1916) are housed in the Library of Congress.

You may notice, if you should happen to click on all of these links, that all of these artists are deceased. There appear to be almost no modern fairy tale works to be found, making me even more happy to have found that page on Stumble! but, once again, I'm left wanting more. Let the research continue!

Sunday Salon - June 7

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of having lunch with my cousin, her friend, my cousin's daughter and my own daughter at the art museum. It was happenstance that we happened to be there when admission was free (yah!) but more importantly, when the museum was hosting an exhibit dedicated to the artwork from Golden Books, the books so many of us grew up on.

I had always thought of the artwork in these books as being of one type, but this exhibit proved that my memory was quite faulty. Among the illustrators shown were Richard Scarry and Hilary Knight (who provides the illustrations for the "Eloise" series of books). Many of the illustrations displayed are from books I still have in my possession and took me back to my earliest recollections of reading. Do you remember reading "Chicken Little," "The Little Red Hen," or "The Pokey Little Puppy?"

On Sunday 4/5 of my family headed off to headed off to enjoy lunch with my parents and usher at their community playhouse's production of "The Producers." They have very good talent in their city and the production was just wonderful. Sadly, like so many theaters, financially times are tough. The next time you're thinking of going out for the evening, why not forgo the movie multiplex and support one of your local theaters?

Pictures At An Exhibition by Sarah Houghtelling

Pictures At An Exhibition by Sarah Houghteling
243 pages
Published February 2009 by Knopf Publishing Group

Synopsis:
Born to an art dealer and his pianist wife, Max Berenzon is forbidden from entering the family business for reasons he cannot understand. He reluctantly attends medical school, reserving his true passion for his father’s beautiful and brilliant gallery assistant, Rose Clément. When Paris falls to the Nazis, the Berenzons survive in hiding. They return in 1944 to find that their priceless collection has vanished: gone are the Matisses, the Picassos, and a singular Manet of mysterious importance. Madly driven to recover his father’s paintings, Max navigates a torn city of corrupt art dealers, black marketers, Résistants, and collaborators. His quest will reveal the tragic disappearance of his closest friend, the heroism of his lost love, and the truth behind a devastating family secret.

My Thoughts:
Meticulously researched, Houghteling wraps a fiction story in the history of the Paris art scene in the time period surrounding WWII. Houghteling has, in fact, done so much research that the book can get bogged down in the prcoess as she tries to fit it all in. There are so many stories going on in this book that Houghteling doesn't follow through on except Max's personal quest to earn his father's respect and try to learn why they've had the relationship they've had. The only way to solve this problem would have been to make the story longer, and, frankly, it was a slow read as it was. Max's quest did begin to feel a bit like something out of a movie--you know the ones, where everything that can go wrong, does. Houghteling has talent and this is a debut novel that will make people look forward to her sophomore effort.

I must say, I did agree with S. Krishna, at http://www.skrishnasbooks.com who wrote in her review of this book: "I have to say, my favorite part of the book was the Afterword. Houghteling takes the time to explain her sources and shows that most of the book comes from actual historical documentation. I found this fascinating, and wished all the more that the recovery of looted art had been more of a focus for the book."