West's 25th novel—a knockout, in-depth, hard-to-put-down show of the author's smarts about the art world, with a murder subplot. A young American in Italy, Max Mather is an art historian and paleologist (scholar of ancient manuscripts) hired by the Palombini family to care for their cache of old, old books and artworks. He's also Pia Palombini's lover, and when she dies, she wills him his choice of a gift from the cache. Looking over the treasures (they're mostly third-rate), he finds mention of a pair of Raphaels, commissioned by the Palombini family in 1605. And, lo, there they are—under a dusty pile, sealed in wax, uncatalogued and unknown to the world. He scoots off to a Zurich safe-deposit with them. Then he sets about becoming an art dealer in Manhattan, with ties in Europe, while plotting to boost the auction price of the paintings up to the $100 millions. He falls in with former lover Anne-Marie Loredon and joins her in setting up a fancy new Soho art gallery, which just happens to be in the building where a possibly great American painter, Madeleine Bayard, had her studio and was murdered. Max and Anne-Marie plan to exhibit the late Madeleine, though the solving of her murder is small stuff set beside Max's slyness in bringing the Raphaels to light in a way that won't have the Italian government compromising a sale of what they may claim to be their national treasures. Max enlists and is hired by Harmon Seldes (read Hilton Kramer), editor of Belvedere; works his way into the cold graces of Henri Berchmans, the world's top art dealer; parries with Edward Bayard, dead Madeleine's lawyer husband; digs up Niccolo Tolentino, who made copies of the two Raphaels in 1945; sets up a front corporation in Zurich to handle his dealings; and is drawn in by Hugh Loredon, Anne-Marie's terminally ill father who is a famed auctioneer and falsely accuses Max's lesbian editor on Belvedere of murdering Madeleine. Deft characters show us how the art world works. Hugely satisfying.
Pub Date: May 1, 1991
ISBN: 0-312-05895-0
Page Count: -
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1991
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
