The English Masterpiece
Twenty-eight-year-old Lily Summers toils as the assistant to the imperious keeper of London’s Tate Museum Modern Collection. When not working, Lily helps her partially paralyzed mother and her PTSD-suffering father and secretly copies paintings by modern masters. On the day after Picasso’s death in 1973, Lily’s boss, Diana, decides she wants to display a grand assortment of Picasso’s works to celebrate his genius, woo high-end donors, and enhance her own stature. The Picasso exhibit comes together splendidly until Lily, circulating among the guests with her champagne flute in hand, stands at one Picasso painting and declares too loudly, “It’s a forgery.” Chaos follows. The exhibit shuts down. London tabloids love the scandal. Diana and Lily fear for their jobs and reputations.
Questions central to the proper functioning of the art world pile up. Was this piece forged? Was the owner who recently paid a fortune for it defrauded? If so, did Diana know? What made Lily utter such blasphemy at the mere “look” of the piece? Was she the forger? Soon a handsome American insurance investigator arrives, interviews witnesses and orders pigment tests.
Reay tells the story from Lily and Diana’s easy-to-follow but intense points of view. These two are clever, observant, and deeply devoted to high-end art. We follow how they ponder over tiny details, life’s larger challenges, and each other. Through them we learn about great artists, art collectors, and expert forgers. The main plot turns into a whodunit with several over-the-top twists. From first page to last, Lily and Diana’s personalities and the backstories that brought them together grab hold and do not let go until long after the page-turner ending. Recommended.
