A Nearly Perfect Copy: A Novel
Amend (Stations West, 2010) puts her provocative and original spin on the art-forgery novel. Writing with supple command, caustic wit, and a deep fascination with decent people who lose their moral compass, Amend brings us into a classy New York art auction house founded by Elm’s (for Elmira) great-grandfather, where she is the expert on drawings and prints. In spite of her successful professional and personal lives, Elm is as vulnerable as everyone else to tragedy and the aberrations of grief. As she struggles with loss, Gabriel, a poor, discouraged Spanish artist in Paris, suddenly finds a path to success after meeting a shrewd and sexy woman at an opening. Elm and Gabriel both end up snared in a web of high-stakes deceit involving illicit copies. Not just forgeries but also, of all disturbing things, clones. As Amend tracks the descent of her two wounded and alienated innocents into lies, desperation, and crime, her visual acuity, fluent psychology, venture into the shadow side of the art world, and storytelling verve make for a blue-chip novel of substance and suspense. --Donna Seaman