Art Appreciation: The Last Painting of Sara de Vos | 2016

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"The paintings on your walls, the Dutch rivers and kitchens, the Flemish peasant frolics, they give off fumes and dull with age, but connect you to a bloodline of want, to shipbuilders and bankers who stared up at them as their own lives tapered off. Like trees, they have breathed in the air around them and now they exhale some of their previous owners' atoms and molecules. They could last for a thousand years, these paintings, and that buoys you as you drift off, a layer just above sleep. Skimming the pond, Rachel used to call it, or was that something you once said to her? You should turn everything off in the room, but you don't. You let the lamps burn all night."
- The Last Painting of Sara de Vos

You guys, this book is #gorgeous.

The Sum of It:

Though people are essential to Dominic Smith's atmospheric story, and represent much of the finely wrought detail, the book's main character is really a melancholy painting by a fictional female Dutch master, Sara de Vos, called "At the Edge of a Wood." We first truly meet the painting in 1950s Manhattan, where it hangs above the bed of wealthy and debonair Marty de Groot, who inherited a vast collection of valuable art and a very Don-Draper sounding penthouse from his father. The painting, which readers can see in their mind's eyes as clearly as if the book contained illustrations thanks to Smith's magical powers of description, depicts a winter scene with a forlorn, barefoot girl at the edge of a wood gazing at children ice skating on a frozen river. Though the painting is sad, its one of Marty's favorites, so when something seems off about the nails in the frame, he realizes that somehow his priceless original has been replaced with a forgery. 

We gradually learn more about the painting in a timeline centuries earlier, where the artist, Sara de Vos, and her hometown in Holland are depicted just as vividly as more contemporary scenes. Though she typically paints only still lifes, Sara is brought to this visual depiction of her own grief following a family tragedy. 

The painting and its meticulous copy that even had Marty fooled for a while in the 1950s come together with Marty and the art forger, in the year 2000 in Australia, when both paintings make their way to a gallery for a highly publicized show. 

Along the way, luminous depictions of 1950s New York dinner parties and jazz clubs, fabulous Manhattan homes and humble artist's apartments in Brooklyn, the bleak but beautiful landscapes and ruined villages of the Netherlands of long ago, and well-heeled art galleries and seaside scenery of modern-day Australia all wrap you in the world of the story. Aside from the painting, the book's other beautifully drawn main characters: art collector Marty, art historian Ellie, and enigmatic painter Sara bring to light the very human themes of self-reflection, loss, heartache, and what it means to grow old. 

The YOA Treatment:

Once again we find a tale that toes the line between genre fiction and literary fiction, a line we constantly bump up against (and wonder if we could just throw out?) in our travels here on the blog. This book certainly begins as a #whodunnit; a valuable painting is missing from a very secure penthouse apartment and replaced by a meticulous but still fake copy -- who managed to steal it and how? Was the forger the same person who crept in and stole away with it? This central mystery is also supplemented by the mystery of the painting itself. So little is known of the artist, Sara de Vos, or why she seems to have only one work, despite being the first female member of the artist's Guild of St. Luke. We have the added suspense of the forgery and original coming together under the watchful eyes of both the forger and original owner; how will that situation conclude? Who knows how much? It'll keep you turning the pages, that's for sure.

On the other hand, this book is so beautifully written that those who feel crime fiction is not really capable of being true art might protest to us placing it so close to the genre fiction line (we aren't those people, obvi). Each time period painted in this tale is so painstakingly drawn you might as well be watching a movie (and just to be clear, we'd watch a movie of this one fo sho). As someone who secretly wishes she could go back in time and study art history and spend days studying brushstrokes in a museum, the windows into the world of painters and art collectors is a genuine treat you want to wrap yourself in like a beautiful cashmere blanket. The language (ever important to us, especially Emily) is so lovely and glittering it could high five Annie Dillard. Each character struggles with their own identity, and how their actions reflect who they are (or want to be) as each timeline is drawn closer and closer together. Basically, GO READ IT and THANK US LATER #yourewelcome. 

- E. 

Thrillingly Exclusive Author Interview: Anton DiSclafani and The After Party | 2016

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"It's the women who still ask me about Joan. Young women, who have stumbled upon her story and my part in it. Old women, who used to admire her photographs in the gossip columns: Joan the jewel, a glimmer on some man's arm. Frank Sinatra's, Dick Krueger's, Diamond Glenn's. They want to know who she was. First, I tell them, she was Furlow Fortier's little blond darling. From the very beginning, she was adored." - The After Party, Prologue

We are basically swooning with excitement to share below a little interview with amazing author (and professor at Emily's alma mater, Auburn University #wareagle) Anton DiSclafani #suchanhonor #blogfeelssolegit! The interview was born out of questions we debated after reading her most recent book, which she was kind enough to discuss with us. So first, a bit of a summary of The After Party, followed by our discussion in the YOA Treatment section. 

The Sum of It:

On a recent rainy getaway weekend at a pretty fabulous house on the water, I (Emily) had a chance to absolutely devour Anton DiSclafani's newest novel, The After Party. Audrey and I both read The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls a couple years ago during the first year of the two-person book club that eventually evolved into The Year of Agatha and LOVED it, so when we heard Ms. DiSclafani had a new title (with this absolutely gorgeous cover), we were 100% in. 

The After Party is a sumptuous depiction of the high life in Texas in the mid-century, painting pictures of the clothes, hair styles, home decor, and cocktails that period of time immediately conjurs. More significantly, though, the book is an intricate study of the many depths each person holds, and the way those layers impact personal relationships. As with The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls, the characters in the book are linked not just by friendship but by more than one secret, which ties the action and narration together and is gradually revealed throughout the story. This book will make you want a stiff cocktail and a chaise lounge, and will also make you think and bring you to tears. Can't recommend it enough. Get thee to your local bookshop today!

The YOA Treatment:

This year, as our faithful readers know, now that we've completed our reading of the entire Christie canon we are trying to explore the broader world of crime and mystery fiction. However, as we dig into our "to be read" stacks, we've run up against the question of what exactly is the line between genre fiction of that nature and just the use of elements of it in literary fiction. The After Party is one of the books we've read this year that raised that question for us, so we were really pumped to discuss that very thing with author Anton DiSclafani! Without further ado: 

YOA asks: Books like The After Party have led us to ask ourselves where the line is drawn between the crime fiction/mystery genre and great literary fiction that uses some element of mystery or crime to advance the plot. What are your thoughts on (as you've so eloquently posed) where this line is drawn, how authors straddle or cross it, and what type of books result when the line is crossed or blurred? 

AD answers: I think interesting, vital books result whenever a line is crossed or blurred. I teach creative writing, and I talk to my students a lot about the difference between literary fiction and genre fiction. I don't care if they write about zombies, or a broken marriage, or the dissolution of a marriage brought about by zombies; I care about being surprised by their stories. I want to not know what's going to happen next. For me, that's genre fiction--turning a page and knowing, more or less, what's on the next page. So any fiction that combines certain elements of genre fiction--in my case, mystery--and then the hallmarks of literary fiction--a character-driven story: well, that's my sweet spot, as a writer and a reader.

I appreciate a good plot. Plot is difficult, but it should also be simple. If I'm not able to explain to you in a few sentences what the plot of my book is about, then it's too convoluted. 

     

YOA asks: Both of your most recent books (The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls and The After Party) have elements of secrecy and crimes that add to the compelling plots and are part of what keeps readers turning the pages to get to the bottom of what really happened in the characters' lives. From where does your inspiration come for these elements in your work (i.e. any authors you're inspired by, stories in the news, photos, strictly your imagination)?

AD answers: I love Kazuo Ishiguro, and his unreliable narrators. I love Kate Walbert, for atmosphere and sheer beauty of prose. (And both these authors are interested in secrets, in their own way.) I'm not inspired by real-life events per se, but I am interested in all the ways women were compelled to keep secrets, historically-speaking, especially when the secrets involved sexuality or children. A friend told a story about a a great-aunt who came of age in the 30s. She had a child out of wedlock when she was a teenager, and that child (a boy) was raised as his mother's brother by her parents (and his grandparents). That's convoluted, I know, but the lengths women (and their families) went to, or were forced to go to, in order to hide children were, well, convoluted. And deeply sad. I suppose THE AFTER PARTY was inspired by a story like that. 

YOA asks: Based on our research over the course of the last year in learning more about Agatha Christie and her peers in the mystery/crime fiction genre, it has seemed that historically, writers of genre fiction such as this have perhaps not received the same level of respect as writers of literary fiction. Do you feel like that has changed/is changing in recent years? And if so, why do you think that might be? 

AD answers: I think I am perceived as writing women's fiction more than I am perceived as writing mystery/crime fiction, though I am flattered by the categorization! I really admire writers who can do plot. I hope the perception is changing, and there are certainly authors who are doing both: John Banville, who writes under the pen name Benjamin Black when he's doing mystery. Sarah Waters is genius at plot, and I don't think anyone could argue with her literary merit. People want to read a good story; I like to believe, as a writer, that readers want to be surprised, not just engaged. Or that their engagement depends on a book doing something interesting, something different. 

YOA asks: Our final question: Have you read Agatha Christie's work in the past, and if so, could you tell us your favorite of her books? 

AD answers: Sadly, a long time ago, and I remember enjoying it but I definitely need to revisit her work. Especially after hanging out on The Year of Agatha!

Well, we are #flattered to hear that, and so, so grateful for Ms. DiSclafani's willingness to share her brilliant thoughts here at The Year of Agatha. We hope you've all enjoyed it as well! 

- E.