Book Review: The Lost Van Gogh by Jonathan Santlofer

 

When artist Luke Perrone's art historian girlfriend, Alexis Verde, bought a cheap painting from a thrift store, little did they expect to find a lost work by Van Gogh hidden inside it. Rumours of a self-portrait painted just before his death and stolen during his funeral have always been around in the circles of art experts, collectors, curators, and the dangerous underworld of the art world. When someone steals the Van Gogh, Perrone has to join hands with Interpol agent Smith and uncover an art puzzle. But he never anticipated that there would be many bigger and more treacherous players searching for it, and the quest would lead to the unveiling of the mysteries of a dark era in human history.

The Lost Van Gogh is a historical mystery novel written by Jonathan Santlofer, with criminal activities associated with art works as the background. I received an advance review copy of the book by the publisher, Sourcebook Landmark, through Netgalley in exchange for honest feedback. This is the second installment of the series that started with The Lost Mona Lisa, which I never had the opportunity to read. This one can be read as a stand-alone novel, though the relationships between some of the main characters are continued from the predecessors, and reading that one, I hope, may illuminate the plot more vividly.

The theme of the novel is very interesting and has elements of several conspiracy theories spun into its plot, like the mysterious death of Van Gogh and the case of numerous valuable artworks stolen by the Third Reich from the hands of Jews, many of whom were ultimately tortured and killed. The novel asks a pertinent question about the future of such stolen art that even today adorns many major museums around the world and if they have a moral obligation to return them back to their rightful owners or their heirs. The novel makes the reader aware of the fact that these art works, termed degenerate art by the Nazis, are still sold and bought globally through underground channels, involving dark web and hired muscle.

The plot of the novel reminded me of Dan Brown novels that use real events and places to narrate an intriguing mystery. Though I am not an avid reader of his, I love the way he fuses facts and fiction, which can be found in The Lost Van Gogh too. But here, the welding is improper, and the two elements—actual history and a concocted story—stay apart. The life of Van Gogh or the fate of degenerate art never comes to the forefront and affects the plot. Instead, we find a generic race-against-time kind of thriller, which I agree is a pretty engaging one, reducing the titular painting to just a macguffin in the plot.

The writer has chosen to narrate the novel using first, second, and third-person narrators. All the chapters that are from the point of view of Perrone are narrated with him as the first-person narrator. Other chapters where he doesn't appear are in third-person narrative, except a few chapters in between using second-person to capture the point of view of a mysterious character whose identity is revealed only towards the end. I've read some incredible and complex novels that use such a structure, which aids in developing a complex plot or making the reader find aspects in it that may never be revealed by a standard narration. For a plain suspense thriller, I am not sure if such gimmicks are warranted.

The novel has around a hundred chapters, most of them only two or three pages long. I found it tough to properly follow the characters or plot threads. In such a novel that has many characters and subplots, a sudden shift of perspective and narrator, I feel, breaks the flow. Whole reading and small chapters had the effect of watching tiktoks or reels. I also felt that concentrating all expositions in a few chapters has also spoiled the fun of reading.

The upcoming historical thriller The Lost Van Gogh by Jonathan Sandlofer is a standard thriller with certain important and timely themes that may make the reader interested in learning more about history and the arts.