Fic­tion

The Rem­brandt Affair

  • Review
By – September 26, 2011

The lat­est in Daniel Silva’s Gabriel Allon series is the best one yet. Our hero — the dead­ly yet sen­si­tive, larg­er than life but under­stat­ed mas­ter art restor­er — is called upon to recov­er a long miss­ing Rem­brandt paint­ing. The sto­ry takes us to Eng­land, France, Argenti­na, Hol­land, Switzer­land, and Wash­ing­ton D.C. as we dis­cov­er the prove­nance of this work of art. The sto­ry is set in the present, when price­less paint­ings are going miss­ing from muse­ums and pri­vate col­lec­tions, nev­er to be found again. From young, inno­cent vic­tims of the Holo­caust to charis­mat­ic, duplic­i­tous inter­na­tion­al busi­ness­men, we read about the many per­son­al­i­ties involved in the his­to­ry of this lost Rem­brandt. Silva’s ele­gant writ­ing is a spe­cial treat for spy thriller fans, who will also learn about the art of restora­tion, the his­tor­i­cal con­texts of this sto­ry, and world cur­rent events. Sil­va elu­ci­dates the truth in today’s incred­i­bly com­pli­cat­ed inter­na­tion­al schemes and has this read­er hop­ing that a real Gabriel Allon is out there serv­ing jus­tice! May Daniel Sil­va nev­er tire of Gabriel Allon’s cru­cial mission.

Miri­am Brad­man Abra­hams, mom, grand­mom, avid read­er, some­time writer, born in Havana, raised in Brook­lyn, resid­ing in Long Beach on Long Island. Long­time for­mer One Region One Book chair and JBC liai­son for Nas­sau Hadas­sah, cur­rent­ly pre­sent­ing Inci­dent at San Miguel with author AJ Sidran­sky who wrote the his­tor­i­cal fic­tion based on her Cuban Jew­ish refugee family’s expe­ri­ences dur­ing the rev­o­lu­tion. Flu­ent in Span­ish and Hebrew, cer­ti­fied hatha yoga instructor.

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