Here are 100 books that The Improbability of Love fans have personally recommended if you like
The Improbability of Love.
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I love historical fiction, and with dual timelines, I often find myself identifying with a contemporary character who is trying to solve some mystery from the past. I wrote an article titled Five Questions to Ask Before Writing a Dual Timeline Novel, in which I addressed structure, how to relate the timelines to each other, and how to keep the reader engaged when going back and forth between time periods. I also wrote a blog post about how fitting the pieces together for this kind of work can be a bit like solving a jigsaw puzzle. Each of the novels I’ve recommended is an example of a satisfying final picture.
I always find books about artists intriguing, and this one adds a bit of forgery, too. In 1631 Amsterdam, Sara de Vos is widowed, inheriting her husband’s debt. She paints to eke out a living, though that is not easy for a woman of that time and place. In 1957, a young art student agrees to forge one of de Vos’s works, only to be haunted by her crime in Sydney in 2000, when she becomes a famous art historian and curator.
I loved this book when I read it and went back to it again when I later decided to write The Map Colorist, my own novel set in seventeenth-century Amsterdam.
'. . . worthy of comparison to Tracy Chevalier's Girl with a Pearl Earring and Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch . . . A masterly, multilayered story that will dazzle readers.' Library Journal (starred review)
In 1631, Sara de Vos is admitted to the Guild of St. Luke in Holland as a master painter, the first woman to be so honoured. Three hundred years later, only one work attributed to de Vos is known to remain - a haunting winter scene, At the Edge of a Wood, which hangs over the Manhattan bed of a wealthy descendant of the original owner.…
I’ve written some dozen books. After publishing the first 10, I realized I love to write about young people just finding out who they are and what’s important to them. I love to look back at that impressionable age and watch it unfold. So my last two books were YA—one set at a Quaker prep school and the other set in a dystopian city-state where teenage boys could be killed when they turn eighteen, and teenage girls could be used for sexual exploitation and discarded as easily as old milk cartons. Those troubled, tumultuous, anything-can-happen hovering adulthood years from about fifteen to twenty-one fascinate me and inspire my writing.
Where to start? I’d read The Secret History and found it mesmerizing, but I loved this book more. It was more personal, and I couldn’t get enough of it.
I loved the premise and the relationships between the characters, even though they were completely flawed. I bought into everything they did and thought and wondered what I would have done in the same circumstances and conditions. The writing is extraordinary, and anyone who loves to read prose that sings will adore this book as I did.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2014 Aged thirteen, Theo Decker, son of a devoted mother and a reckless, largely absent father, survives an accident that otherwise tears his life apart. Alone and rudderless in New York, he is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. He is tormented by an unbearable longing for his mother, and down the years clings to the thing that most reminds him of her: a small, strangely captivating painting that ultimately draws him into the criminal underworld. As he grows up, Theo learns to glide between the drawing rooms of the…
What makes me passionate about this topic is my love of art, encouraged by my parents and developed when I was completing an undergraduate degree in architecture. I’m also addicted to mysteries, preferably ones with history thrown into the mix. Born in Australia, I lived for some years in the UK before moving to Canberra. I hold a PhD from the London School of Economics and I’m a professor at the Australian National University. I do hope you enjoy the books on my list as much as I have.
Every novel Peter Carey writes is a rollicking adventure and this one is no exception. I love his way with words that is always original, and his idiosyncratic characters.
Theft tells the story of Michael "Butcher" Boone, an Australian artist whose career is in the doldrums. The novel alternates between the viewpoint of Butcher and that of his "damaged" brother Hugh. And yes, there is theft in the novel,…and scams and forgeries too. This is my favourite of all Carey’s novels.
Michael "Butcher" Boone is an ex-“really famous" painter, now reduced to living in a remote country house and acting as caretaker for his younger brother, Hugh. Alone together they've forged a delicate equilibrium, a balance instantly destroyed when a mysterious young woman named Marlene walks out of a rainstorm and into their lives. Beautiful, smart, and ambitious, she's also the daughter-in-law of the late great painter Jacques Liebovitz. Soon Marlene sets in motion a chain of events that could be the making--or the ruin--of them all.
What makes me passionate about this topic is my love of art, encouraged by my parents and developed when I was completing an undergraduate degree in architecture. I’m also addicted to mysteries, preferably ones with history thrown into the mix. Born in Australia, I lived for some years in the UK before moving to Canberra. I hold a PhD from the London School of Economics and I’m a professor at the Australian National University. I do hope you enjoy the books on my list as much as I have.
I’d been working on my novel when I heard about the publication of The Artist’s Portrait. I at once read it because I adore the topic and also because I wanted to make sure I wasn’t writing about material that was too similar (it wasn’t!).
In Julie Keys’ beautiful novel, we see why there’ve been so few women artists… and we also get a good dose of excitement as there is murder and mystery too.
'An intriguing read with compelling descriptions of early 20th-century Sydney in all its squalor, debauchery and fascinating historical detail.' Who Weekly
'a brisk, original tale written with verve' Mud Literary Prize judging committee
A story about art, murder, and making your place in history.
Whatever it was that drew me to Muriel, it wasn't her charm.
In 1992, morning sickness drives Jane to pre-dawn walks of her neighbourhood where she meets an unfriendly woman who sprays her with a hose as she passes by. When they do talk: Muriel Kemp eyes my pregnant…
As both a lifelong traveler and reader, I cannot start an adventure without a great book. Having owned a Kindle since 2008, I consistently carry a virtual library, curating an assortment of captivating reads for every journey. As a travel journalist, I fly multiple times a month, which amplifies my need and understanding of the perfect in-flight companions; stories that transport and captivate. As an author with a memoir to my name, I appreciate the transformative power of storytelling. This blend of literary passion, frequent travel, and personal authorship has led me on my search for engaging, unforgettable books that mesmerize the reader.
This book is a captivating tale of passion, history, and mystery. Set against the backdrop of 1940s Chicago and war-torn Europe, the novel follows the journey of a resilient journalist navigating love and espionage.
Barr's evocative prose and meticulous research transport readers to a bygone era, creating a rich tapestry of emotions. The intricate blend of romance and suspense ensures a thrilling reading experience perfectly suited for the transient nature of air travel.
As you glide through the clouds, let the pages of this book transport you to a riveting tale of love, courage, and intrigue, making your journey truly unforgettable.
THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER, SOON TO BE A MOVIE PRODUCED BY AND STARRING SHARON STONE A BUZZFEED MUST-READ FOR 2022
A young journalist embroiled in an international art scandal centred around a Nazi-looted masterpiece, forcing the ultimate showdown between passion and possession, lovers and liars, history and truth.
After talking her way into a job in Chicago, young journalist Jules Roth is given an unusual assignment: locate a painting stolen by the Nazis more than 75 years ago. The painting? None other than legendary artist Ernst Engel's most famous work, Woman on Fire. A dying designer covets the portrait…
Shirley Jackson award-winner Kaaron Warren published her first short story in 1993 and has had fiction in print every year since. She was recently given the Peter McNamara Lifetime Achievement Award and was Guest of Honour at World Fantasy 2018, Stokercon 2019 and Geysercon 2019. She has also been Guest of Honour at Conflux in Canberra and Genrecon in Brisbane.
She has published five multi-award winning novels (Slights, Walking the Tree, Mistification, The Grief Hole and Tide of Stone) and seven short story collections, including the multi-award winning Through Splintered Walls. Her most recent short story collection is A Primer to Kaaron Warren from Dark Moon Books. Her most recent novella, Into Bones Like Oil (Meerkat Press), was shortlisted for a Shirley Jackson Award and the Bram Stoker Award, winning the Aurealis Award. Her stories have appeared in both Ellen Datlow’s and Paula Guran’s Year’s Best anthologies.
A
fascinating Australian story about a man who is certain he has unearthed a
painting by the renowned Australian painter Lloyd Rees. While this isn’t
exactly about stolen art, it is about a painting that went missing, and whose
provenance was lost. It depicts just how obsessed we can become with a single
image.
I'm a social anthropologist who has lived, dreamed, and worked in Syria most of her life. Having spent my childhood in Damascus I always yearned to return. After completing my PhD at the University of California, Los Angeles, in the economy of modern Bedouin Tribes, I won a Fulbright award to teach at the University of Damascus. Since then, Damascus has been at the centre of my academic and social life. I met my husband there, a British helicopter pilot, sent there to learn Arabic. I'm an emeritus professor of anthropology and forced migration at the University of Oxford and my research has been on the forced migrant communities who make up Syria’s cosmopolitan society.
This is a truly remarkable work. I was expecting a straightforward book of art but discovered a wonderful portrait of Syria in the 20th century. It is an original, creative, and deeply contextualized lens into the modern political history of Greater Syria. It successfully brings natural Syria, Bilad al Sham, into our frame of reference through the work of three main artists: Khalil Gibran, Adham Ismail, and Fateh al Moudarres. In its early chapters, it skillfully describes and analyses Syria’s interface with the late Ottoman period. The Interwar Mandate period is particularly well researched and articulated in drawing Syrian plastic arts into view, as France and other European diplomats, philosophers, and anthropologists’ influenced individual Syrian poets, and philosophers either during their sojourns in Europe or at home in Syria. Beautiful Agitation is an enchanting read, scholarly and lively, making sense for the first time of important Syrian artists’…
In modern Syria, a contested territory at the intersection of differing regimes of political representation, artists ventured to develop strikingly new kinds of painting to link their images to life forces and agitated energies. Examining the works of artists Kahlil Gibran, Adham Ismail, and Fateh al-Moudarres, Beautiful Agitation explores how painters in Syria activated the mutability of form to rethink relationships of figure to ground, outward appearance to inner presence, and self to world. Drawing on archival materials in Syria and beyond, Anneka Lenssen reveals new trajectories of painterly practice in a twentieth century defined by shifting media technologies, moving…
As a teenager, I loved reading past my bedtime, getting lost within a story, then having it fill my dreams and leaving me on the hunt for another book just as good. The best books to read are those that draw me in with their voice and storytelling and leave me needing to turn page after page. Getting in trouble as a kid for reading too late was the best type of trouble to get into and even now, when I need to make a second pot of coffee after a night of reading, I walk away with no regrets.
This story mesmerized me. It’s deceptively deep with a hint of whimsical, and the story plays out in your mind like a movie. It’s so beautifully written that I felt myself pulled in so many emotional directions and needed to let the book sit with me after I finished the final page.
A young girl.
A hidden treasure.
A dark family secret.
'Evocative and enchanting - a future classic' Veronica Henry 'An extraordinary debut... beautiful, dark, haunting' Edward Carey 'A captivating coming-of-age story' Daily Mail 'A bewitching read' Woman & Home
Romilly lives in a ramshackle house with her eccentric artist father and her cat, Monty. She knows little about her past - but she knows that she is loved.
When her father finds fame with a series of children's books starring her as the main character, everything changes: exotic foods appear on the table, her father appears on TV, and strangers…
My mixed media journey began as a kid growing up in a family of scientists and artists. I always loved to combine things, adding unusual objects to my mud sculptures and later mixing things up as a chemistry student. I created some wild concoctions as a bartender and then eventually as an acrylic painter. I began as a traditional oil painter, but I moved on to painting murals on walls, and cutting stones and metalwork. I introduced the other art students to some great construction sites where we would scavenge materials and give them new life. This passion led me to write six books on mixed media.
Jean’s book has a novel format for teaching that I love.
She does begin with an introduction to acrylics but then she breaks down various components with examples and then a featured artist to explore that technique. She shows how collage, texture, drawing, and different styles can turn out so different using the same materials.
Jean is a brilliant figurative mixed media artist and she abstracts the figure in a way that invites even nonobjective painters to want to try a new subject manner. She has some fun composition ideas and even a roadmap of when to add other materials.
A visually beautiful book that will inspire your work no matter what your genre.
Are you interested in adding a bit of mixed media to your artwork but unsure exactly how? Mixed Media Painting Workshop takes the fear out of artistic experimentation and instead celebrates the journey, step by step!
With Mixed Media Painting Workshop, you'll learn a variety of techniques and use a unique selection of materials to express yourself and your style! From backgrounds to sketching, from painting to collage, from the elements of design to subject matter, you'll find it all right here!
My mixed media journey began as a kid growing up in a family of scientists and artists. I always loved to combine things, adding unusual objects to my mud sculptures and later mixing things up as a chemistry student. I created some wild concoctions as a bartender and then eventually as an acrylic painter. I began as a traditional oil painter, but I moved on to painting murals on walls, and cutting stones and metalwork. I introduced the other art students to some great construction sites where we would scavenge materials and give them new life. This passion led me to write six books on mixed media.
Color is visual and this book shows you through images how colors interact with each other and what constitutes good color combinations.
She sets the foundation for rules and color strategies, but she moves on to incorporate various color wheels and finished paintings using those selected colors. I love how she categorizes various color wheels from traditional to bold, opaque earth, old masters, and modern palettes.
She also shows paintings using various color combinations from triads to analogous color combinations and all the other possible combos.
I love this book because it is educational and visually beautiful.
Learn how to use color in your own unique and expressive way!
Color is what you make it: sensitive, explosive, dreamlike, atmospheric, somber, cheerful. Nita Leland brings logic and intuition together to create a foundation for color selections that allow you to be more inventive, break out of old habits and experiment with new colors. Her approach eliminates time-wasting trial and error while giving you the freedom to use color in personal, meaningful and exciting ways.
Features:
• Artwork from more than 50 contributing artists that illustrates many personal approaches to color • 85 "Try It" activities that will help…
