Devil's Paintbrush

by Martin Dibner

Adam Stark, director of Van Damms, a prestigious New York art gallery, puts his marriage, career, and life on the line as he attempts to authenticate a lost masterpiece by Hieronymus Bosch

346 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Martin Dibner, a native of Brooklyn, attended the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, earning a bachelor's degree in banking and finance. He briefly worked as a commercial artist in New York City and Miami before serving in the Navy as a gunnery officer during World War II. After the war, he did graduate work in painting and sculpture at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

For his best-known novel, "The Deep Six" (1953), set on a ship patrolling the Aleutian Islands during World War II, Mr. Dibner drew on his wartime experience. His eight other novels included "Showcase" (1958), "The Admiral" (1967) and "Ransom Run" (1977). He also wrote the text for "Seacoast Maine" (1973), a book of photographs by George Tice, and "Portrait of Paris Hill" (1990), about a village in Maine.

Mr. Dibner was the first director of the Joan Whitney Payson Gallery at Westbrook College in Portland, Me., from 1975 to 1978, and the first director of the California Arts Commission.