Steal art, not books! (Actually, steal neither): The Last Painting of Sara de Vos, by Dominic Smith

http://us.macmillan.com/

The Last Painting of Sara de Vos

Dominic Smith

Sarah Crighton Books: Farrar, Straus, and Girox, 2016

ISBN: 9780374106683

I’ve mentioned before that I’m a wee smidge bit fascinated by art theft. The definition of wee smidge bit in this case could also be defined as “crazy enough to have a would-steal hit list.” But can you blame me? That art is mesmerizing, and I grew up in a city with a ridiculous unsolved art heist! This, I believe, probably played a small role in my decision to initially major in art history when I started college (just yesterday guys, it wasn’t over a decade ago or anything…). It was a fling that didn’t last for practical reasons, but we’ve kept a small flame burning as part-time lovers. The initial tete a tete lasted a course or two long enough to leave me with lasting curiosity, appreciation, and the sense that had I stayed the course, I may have specialized in Flemish works. Those colors, you guys!

The plot to The Last Painting of Sara de Vos, therefore, is right up my alley. Flemish painting? Check. Stolen painting? Check. Forged painting? Check. Spanning centuries, decades, continents? Check. Female painters? Ummm...rare and wonderful check, please. Did I mention I really enjoy art theft stories yet? So yeah, I RSVP’d yes to this party, and I wasn’t disappointed by anything but a lack of an explanation as to how said thefting actually went down, but you know what? The rest is pretty solid, and has bonus meta-con-artistry, beautiful imagery, adeptly drawn characters, clear yet elegant language, the timeless sense of a piece of masterful art, and a patina of mystery. Because it is summer and I don't want your brains to rot,  I'm assigning you a grown up book with some big words.  And because the publisher description is what grabbed me and there's some sun I want to get after, I am sharing that below!

Art Heisting + Libraries? LOVE.

GUYS.  I love a good shady Boston art heist, but this just jumped up a notch.  A library art heist?  Be still, heart.  

Two etchings whose estimated worth is $600, 000 was reported missing from the Boston Public Library.  Three weeks after they were noted as missing.  They are "hoping it has been misfiled." SHADY.

But serious party foul, BPL.  Three weeks? That seems questionable.  I'm hoping it's been misfiled in the same crawl space in my basement where I store my Vermeer.  What?? Kidding.  Or am I? 

(I mean, clearly I'm exaggerating and want the art found. I didn't know we had a Durer at the BPL!  I want to see it now!).  

Tidbits (of cheese and other literary goodness)

I'm sorry, two loyal readers, one of whom I'm pretty sure is a spambot! I've been super busy - ALA, work, other job, other things...but in good news, I do have some recipes and reviews forthcoming...errrr...as soon as I get the chance to write them.  I have, however, been hoarding up way, way, old news and things.  You've probably already seen them, but I don't care!  Enjoy them or not; as Captain Planet would say, the power is yours!

Food

• Behold, the greatest post I have ever seen: author and cheese pairings.  I mean...does it get any more fantastic than that?  But I have to ask, why no cheddar cheese pic for Ernest?  
• Do you want to make a chocolate loving librarian very happy?  Give them a library of exotic chocolate bars.
• Enjoy this map of the United States of Burgers, just because it is summer, and you are thinking about BBQs, right? 

Art

•  This artists description says it all ("art inspired by and made from books"), but her method of delivery - finger prints - is really cool!  
• Just because I loved it so much when I came upon it, I'm going to share the best, loveliest watercolor prints that would be great in a kitchen.  Speaking of making a librarian very happy, I happen to know a librarian who loves the olive oil print...

Movies

• Stills from The Maze Runner!  I'm not even in a tither about how much the actors are not 13.  It looks great! 
• However, the kid who just got cast as Jonas in the Jeff Bridges adaptation of The Giver?  He does not look like a preteen.  Just sayin'...
• There's a run on Jane Austen on the interwebs this week!  First, check out the trailer for Austenland, which I'm really, really looking forward to, because OBVI.  Then, check out this gigantic waterlogged statue of Colin Firth's Darcy.  Wouldn't you love to know what he thinks? And more importantly, what happens when birds poo on that super white shirt?

Books

• This is olllld news at this point.  John Corey Whaley - he of the dipples who shared his woodpecker tattoo with us - is coming out with a new book! YAY! The cover art was released, and now haunts my dreams.  #creepydolls
• Best. Manicures. Ever. 
• Are you a demigod?  Do you want to be one?  Good thing we had this talk.  There's a Camp Half-Blood you can attend! Percy Jackson camp, y'all!  Is there one for grownups?  I want to go! (I think I may have posted about this a million years ago, but if I've forgotten, so have you!) 
• There was an EW issue about Divergent!  There were lots of pictures for your eyeballs to feast upon, and the trailer is being released at Comic-Con.  But I've posted the most important information below:

PAMUKED!

Tidbits

Books

• It took me long enough BUT.  Best news ever red alert, via your, my, everyone's favorite Melina Marchetta:
  They’ve also come back into my life at an important time for writing because 24 year old Jimmy Hailler is camping out in my head.  It’s not just his story, but a bit of a four hander and it will definitely be an adult one rather than YA.  It’s interesting that I didn’t know where Jimmy and his life was until I played with circumstances in Froi and Quintana’s life.
  
  JIMMY HAILLER.  JIMMY HAILLER.  Plus, word on the street is soon even us Yanks will be able to hang tough with our favorite knocked-up pink taffeta dress wearing exiled princess, Quintana.  2013 is looking up!
• Meta alert! These works of art (books) have been turned into works of art (sculptures)!
• Things I am maybe embarrassed to totally get: Texts from the American Girl dolls (the OG's not these new poseurs).
• Somehow, I missed this most exciting news about Patrick Ness and the new books he's going to drop on us!  
• I'm one part jealous, one part judgmental (it's a private home, also she spit-shone his grave), and one part sorry for the people who live there now this is up on the interwebs - a blogger visited E.B. White's house in Maine.  But mostly...I want to live there?
• If you enjoyed Partials and want more, check out this preview of the sequel, Fragment.  
• Thank GAWD, DGabs. Fall is just around the corner, right?  Alls I'm sayin' is you best not Robert Jordan us, mmkay?
  
• The thievin' thugs of YA (Elizabeth Wein! Shock me, shock me, shock me, with that deviant behavior!)

Movies

• Divergent casting news about Four (Let's just say I saw a lot of Alex Pettyfer in Magic Mike that I can't unsee in picturing him as Four...)
• Don't really want to jinx it, but Y: the Last Man has a director.  Still think it would be better as a mini-series!
• I had no idea that Robopocalypse had even been optioned as a movie, let alone optioned by Spielberg.  
• Whhaaat? EW has some pictures of Catching Fire up (like four), but all you need to know is this:

"People are just worried that I'm not going to be as sex god enough as Finnick should be. I've literally had four months of eating nothing but chicken and asparagus. I just want a burger and a beer."

He's hungry behind the eyes, guys.  (Incidentally, does this picture remind you of anyone else? A certain pasty, Civil War era YA vampire, perhaps?)

Tidbits: One ring really could rule us all...

• Big news in the publishing world...Random House and Penguin may merge.  As in, they are going on some dates together and thinking about taking it further...  Still, there may be a ring in their future...woah!  One ring really could rule us all (more on that below)!
• I love little libraries.  I want a fancy little library, so bad.  But until such time as I frolick away into the mists of the Stars Hollow town of my Gilmore Girl dreams and have me a little library on my hobbitesque yard, I will travel the world to visit tiny libraries, using this handy map.  Pakistan, anyone?  (Also, check out these photos of said world o little libraries).
• Good to know that despite their not being able to fit inside libraries, kids are learning to read good.  Heartening news: Pew says kids use libraries, youth librarians both say duh and do a kickline across the interwebs.  
• Remember AIM away messages?  LOL guyzzzz.  Literary away messages.  (#4 made me snort in a very unladylike way)
• I only have one thing to say about this.  If I had to go into battle, I'd probably use a Christopher Paolini book as a weapon. Maybe the nice boxed set I bought in 2007 under the impression that there were only going to be three...
• Veronica Roth on Disney Princess Factions.  So true, so true.  
• Perhaps you've heard about a little movie coming out in December called the Hobbit?  No? Perhaps you've been too holed up in your local Denny's eating about it.  Yes, eating about it.  According to this article, and the rest of the internet, "Denny’s is hoping one onion ring will rule them all."  Well played.  Bonus points for Air New Zealand's new flight safety video.  
• OH MAN.  I wish I could sew, because Mo Willem's Pigeon inspired costumes are so great...
• This is it people.  I already expressed how this makes me giggle endlessly even thinking about it.  And now...THIS.  This is the cake I want for my birthday.  Bring. It. On.  

Tidbits: I was not in the Netherlands on Tuesday...

• The real question in the art theft I did not commit in the Netherlands is Monet, Matisse, Gauguin...Picasso?  As our friends on Sesame would say, one of these things is not like the others!  (Also, I got $20 and a space on my wall for a Monet, art thieves...)

• The worlds largest floating bookstore (hint: not my bathtub). 

• One Direction fan fiction - face, meet palm.  

• Harry Potter textbook covers. 

• Things I want to eat: Totchos.  Exactly what they sound like.

• Author Crush Melina Marchetta's Quitana finally got a new dress:

 

And I like it.
Except I'm resoundingly convinced she wants to
shank me with that piece.

 

Where Things Come Back, by John Corey Whaley: Except my Sunday School Bible Reference memories

Where Things Come Back
by John Corey Whaley
Atheneum: New York, 2011
ISBN 978-1-4424-133-7

In Lily, Arkansas, population 3,947, nothing much ever happens on a regular basis; people never seem to leave town permanently.  That is, until the population drops to 3946 when 17-year-old Cullen Witter’s 15-year-old brother Gabriel disappears, without a trace, leaving Cullen, his family, his best friend Lucas, and the town reeling.  The news of Gabriel’s disappearance, however, is soon overshadowed by the rumor that the Lazarus mockingbird woodpecker, believed extinct, has been spotted.  But Cullen, his family, and friends haven’t forgotten Gabriel; they are left with more questions than answers, and each struggling to cope in their own way.   For Cullen, this means girls, including his long-time crush, and a recently divorced young woman who has returned to town, and actively hating the Lazarus.  Two stories are seamlessly and satisfyingly woven together in this short, yet rich debut novel, filled with Biblical references, the frustration of growing up in a small town, and the well-crafted, realistic, anguish of inexplicable loss.  This multiple award-winning book is recommended for older teens, grades 10 and up.  

(Biblical confusion after the jump)

Tidbits: A cassoulet of movies, talents in South Beach, other things

Below, my friends, is a hot mess (of links)  I believe the French call this a cassoulet.  Touche!  I have been le busy - I made the brilliant plan to run a book a week book club, and train for a half marathon allll at the same time.  Miraculously, I survived both!  I have a goal to eventually write review and recipes for Middlemarch (preview: it wasn't enjoyed), Slaughterhouse Five (preview: not easy, but powerful stuff), and a few other things I've been ripping through, chiefly CODEREDOHMYGODREADTHISNOW: Code Name Verity, by Elizabeth Wein.  Yes, it is good enough to demand all those caps and no spaces in between.  It may be the best thing I've read all year, and it made me cry on a park bench normally inhabited by a hobo (so you know it's good!).  I'll write more - if you promise to read it.

• I defy you to deny that Lebron James, has, in fact, taken his talents to South Beach.  Behold, the photographic greatness, spotted on Jezebel:
  
  
  YESS.  Please get more boys to read!
  
  
• Have I told you, lately, that I love you, @Queen_UK?  This is all that is right with Twitter and the Interwebs.  My favorite of all the twitter feeds in all the lands, "The Queen" always brings a self aware silliness to the table.  Articles like this don't hurt either.

• I am a younger female faculty member in an environment with lots of teenage boys, commonly know of by its formal name, a high school.  This means it is always high comedy to ask me to the prom.  Somehow, it never gets old to anyone besides, oh, me.  In case the whole "being an adult" diagnosis wasn't enough evidence of why it's a bad idea, some lady proved it.  "[S]he went to last month's Condon High School prom with a boy from the track team because the boy felt bad about not having a date and had been struggling in English class." Struggling in English? Why didn't you say so? That TOTALLY makes it not weird! This is too terrible to even earn a Case of the Terribles rating (Spotted on Jezebel).
  
• The Great Gatsby trailer is out, finally!  And yet...I have no recollection of this story.  Except for Daisy.  And I don't remember much about her, other than that she was flighty and blonde and tragic.  And I like what I'm seeing:
  
  
  

  If the trailer soundtrack is anything like what the movie soundtrack will be like, I'm sold.  And please oh please where can I get me some of those dresses? More importantly, when does the next Bright Young Things book dropping already?
  
• The trailer for The Perks of Being a Wallflower drops soon!  FINALLY.  June 3, during the MTV Movie Awards, which I probably haven't been able to sit through since 2002.  That's why I keep you around, Internets. 
  
•  Word and art lovers, check out this super cool cut paper artwork by Annie Vought.  I would love to see famous letters of bygone days or love letters or clandestine paperwork with redactions get this treatment (can you tell I have Code Name Verity on the brain still?) - but can't actually pull an example for my brain.  But still, this is super cool.  (Spotted on Colossal)

Tibits: Fishing without bait, evil girl scout geniuses, Nook (is not a dirty word), books as art, etc.

• Oh hey you guys. A super cute picture of the Perks of Being a Wallflower Christmas party scene.  Sure they look cute and all.  Sure, fashion today kind of mirrors that of when the book is set.  BUT.  I hope they still give each other mix tapes!

This house looks suspiciously modern.

• Downton is (almost) BACK!  Which means my crush on myself is totally making sense after taking the Downton Abbey Quiz.   I'm Matthew Crawley.  Ladies, ladies, calm down.  There's enough of me to go around!  If you need a refresher, the FYA one is highly amusing.  It is the only thing I've ever seen in favor of Lady Edith, who, as a review I read yesterday alleges, "continues to fish without bait."  Oooh Lady Edith!  Incidentally, I'm looking pretty good in the picture used for that review.

• Nook for sale?: I know this sounds dirty.  But get your mind out of the gutter for just one second and we can discuss seriousness.  Is it just me or does this article contradict itself?  All I took from it was that Nook is doing okay, so they want to sell it.  What? 

• New York Times correction:  Just stop.  

• Carved Book Landscapes: These are SO COOL, also gorgeous.  I want them to be on display somewhere nearby so I can actually get up close and ogle them.  

• My first thought on seeing this piece on Christopher Paolini's house: did Christopher Paolini start lifting?  My second thought: when did he become older than me?

• Those little Girl Scout minx's are tempting me with their goodies again.  I'm totally going to buy me some Savannah Smiles.

Tidbits: Feminists like nail polish, Legos, voting, art crime, AND sparkles

I've been hoarding these up for quite a while, team.  I feel pretty terrific about getting them out before the end of the year, so there's a strong chance someone will be treating herself to a cappuccino later today.  Happy 2012!

• Nominate your favorite YA book of 2011 on TeenReads! I'm more than a bit torn between Piper's Son and Scorpio Races.  Luckily, you get to nominate six titles.  PHEW. 

• Attention sparkleprincesses out there: the crack team behind the Hunger Games movie marketing has come out with a gimic you've probably seen on a thousand other blogs - Panem themed nail polish! As they note on this blog, the dozen colors seem to match up pretty well to each of the districts.  Except for 13, which is suspiciously missing from the map.  I smell a conspiracy!  Personally, I am hungry for foie gras.  Served in Peeta bread.

• This magazine cover made me groan when the mail came in at work a few weeks ago.  Boooooo.  I'm pretty sure little girls like Legos.  And they don't need them to be sparkly or pink for the fantasy dream houses and giant towers we build, only to be knocked down by our little siblings. You know, kind of the same way boys play.  How do I know this?  Because I am a girl.  And I loved Legos.  

• Let's keep going on this feminist bender! Here are thirteen fantastic female comic creators of 2011.  From this list, I've only read Anya's Ghost, but have been wanting to read Marzi for a while.  And now I want to read Ivy and Finder. 

• Ahem.  This lady totally has my dreamfantasy job (or rather, the positive version of my Thomas Crown/Uncommon Criminals fantasty).  Let's be best friends. 

Uncommon Criminals, by Ally Carter: My Uncommon Goal of Art Theivery

Uncommon Criminals
by Ally Carter
Disney Hyperion Books: New York, 2011.
ISBN: 978-142314795-4

     Kat Bishop is back again in the second book in Ally Carter's Heist Society series.  This time though, our favorite con-artist with a heart has herself been conned after being led to believe she was returning the allegedly stolen Cleopatra Emerald to its rightful owner.   Embarrassed that she's fallen victim to an old school con artist who seems to think Kat is just like her, Kat reluctantly accepts the help of her crew in retrieving the emerald and reuniting it with it's rightful owner, making things slightly awkward with her possible (if she would only admit it to herself) crush, Hale.  To get the stone back, the crew must work together in a high stakes gamble in the casino's of Monaco, all while trying to avoid the attention of Uncle Eddie, who has specifically instructed them to have nothing to do with the Cleopatra.  This newest edition in the series is an exciting, quickly paced, occasionally romantic read; it may even be stronger than the freshman effort!  It is recommended for libraries serving (probably female) patrons aged 11 to 15, and cool adults who like to pretend like they can be an art thief if their day job doesn't work out.  Ahem...

You guys, this book is really fun.  I encourage you to read it over a vacation or lazy Saturday morning.  It's quick.  It's exciting.  It's white-glove sexy (chaste kissing, not the white doctors office gloves you're thinking of you perv).  It's about art theft!  It's like a girls' version of Ocean's Eleven, before they blew it by making too many (whatever, it's the truth).  Just do it.  You're welcome.

Perhaps you don't remember the promise I made to you several months ago when the first two chapters of this book were up online.  It is likely, because I barely remembered.  You know, the one where I promised to tell you which paintings I'd steal if ever my soul became a blackened coal lump and I turned to a life of art theivery of specific paintings for my own, and only my viewing pleasure? But rejoice, because remember, I did.  And here they are.  There are probably more that I've forgotten, like some Winslow Homer watercolors (how did I miss his watercolors until the age of what I am now?),  Dutch Renaissance Masters, or the crown jewels (which I'll get anyways, when I marry Harry, obvi).

 Paintings I'd Steal
(if ever my soul became blackened coal lump and I turned to a life of art theivery of specific paintings for my own, and only my viewing pleasure)

Mysterious Scottish Library Lover, get at me.

Okay you guys, I think it's time for a confession.  

The mysterious fantastically talented Scottish library lover?  

I know you all thought it was me.   It's not!  

I did not do this.  But I wish I did!

I'm actually Banksy.  

Just kidding.  But in all seriousness, how incredible are these pieces, and how much do you want to find one in your library?  I am hooked.  

I want to know what's next and who is the creative genius behind these!

Andalsoifwecanbebestfriendsandmaybeifyoucouldmakemeone...that would be cool too.

PrE-views! Ally Carter's Uncommon Criminals

Confession:  I am an Art History dropout.  It is a sad but true fact of my life.  I love it, truly, madly, deeply.  I geek out indecently over old paintings and museums.  But apparently at 18 I thought that majoring in Spanish would be much more viable career path.  And now I am a high school librarian.  GO FIGURE! 

Um...but really my wild fantasy dream job was never art historian extraordinare.  It was, is (if this library thing doesn't work out!), top shelf art thief.  You can't really avoid this thought if you are say, an art-luvr living in a city where the Gardner Heist, the greatest unsolved art theft in all the lands  occurred (debatable, but I'm always right, so you lose!).  Thusly, when Heist Society dropped I was stoked!  And now that the second one (Uncommon Criminals) is imminent, I am doubly stoked! Unfortunately for all of us, it does not drop until June 21.  BUT.  BUT.

Join me in tiding ourselves over by reading the first two chapters online!  I salute you for inspiring my criminal mind to dream big, Ally Carter! 

Thusly, when it DOES drop, I promise to release my dream art theft hit list in its honor.  Check your security systems, museums of the world!  Thomas Crowne PaperblogPrincess is coming for you!

I will chill out on the Hunger Games posts, I promise.  But help a sister out first.  I finally got around to reading the April 10th New York Sunday Times Magazine article profiling Suzanne Collins that everyone has been telling me I would like.  It is a good read, check it out!  However, I am infinitely more fascinated by Ryan Graber's artwork that accompanies the article. 

 

Ryan Graber, New York Times, 2011

There was a goat in the Hunger Games?  I have no recollection of this.  Is it a sacred lamb allegory that I'm too dense to get?  Is that Peeta and Katniss, hugging at dead center?  If so, pretty sure he's supposed to be blond...  Irregardless, it's a pretty great cool piece of art that does the article justice. 

Librarian Mecca: Bibliotheca Alexandrina!

 As many of you know, I happen to have an occupational predilection towards libraries.  They excite me with their stores of fantastic knowledge and excellent organization.  Also, the big deal ones?  They tend to be kind of architecturally gorgeous.  Also:  books.  They've got them!  For all these reasons and more (as in, hello opportunity to visit the worlds first library even though the original was burned like six times so it's really not the real deal but whatever), I was stoked to visit the Bibliotheca Alexandrina.  And let me have you know: it is worth a trip.  I gasped when I walked in.  It is really that impressive, huge, and flat out architecturally gorgeous.  I want to go to there every day.  I want to work there.  I want to sneak in and live there in the way that the kids in From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler live in the Met.  No joke.  Am I gushing?  Is the Pope Catholic?  Deal.  I warned you of my occupational predilection.