Could you love a thief if you knew what she did? Here’s my book review of Theft: A Love Story by Peter Carey.

Theft is about art and art fakes, love and betrayal. The notions of both kinds of fraud are intertwined. Thank you Peter Carey for an idiosyncratic writing style – actually, two first-person styles, one for a tormented love-stricken painter Michael, aka Butcher Boone, and the other for his mentally challenged brother Hugh.

What would you do if you were in love with a psychopath and realized you didn’t care what sins that person might or might not have committed? Main character Butcher Boone is a famous abstract painter who lives in a rural area of Australia with brother Hugh. Butcher fears his career is nearly over. Into his life comes beautiful art dealer and appraiser Marlene, who happens to stop by looking for a famous painting by Jacques Leibovitz, the painting owned by Butcher’s next-door neighbor, except the painting goes missing. And it turns out that Marlene is the daughter-in-law of Leibovitz and just about the only expert on the planet who can tell which of the paintings attributed to the dead artist is actually a fake. It shouldn’t be too much of a spoiler to say that in befriending Butcher on the same evening, the Leibovitz is stolen.

Marlene has some serious conflicts of interest!

This novel is also fascinating for the interwoven facts and culture of the real art world. I used to own a Tom Wesselmann, and I agree that his marketability might have exceeded his talent.

In Clifford’s Spiral a stroke survivor tries to piece together the fragments of his memories. Was he the victim or the perpetrator? 2020 IPA Distinguished Favorite in Literary Fiction.