The Burnt Orange Heresy (Movie Tie-In Edition): A Novel

by Charles Willeford

The classic neo-noir novel acclaimed as Willeford’s best, soon to be a major film
 
Fast-talking, backstabbing, womanizing, and fiercely ambitious art critic James Figueras will do anything—blackmail, burglary, and beyond—to make a name for himself. When an unscrupulous collector offers Figueras a career-making chance to interview Jacques Debierue, the greatest living—and most reclusive—artist, the critic must decide how far he will go to become the art-world celebrity he hungers to be. Will Figueras stop at the opportunity to skim some cream for himself or push beyond morality’s limits to a bigger payoff?
 
Crossing the art world with the underworld, Willeford creates a novel of dark hue and high aesthetic polish. The Burnt Orange Heresy—the 1970s crime classic now back in print—has lost none of its savage delights as it re-creates the making of a murderer, calmly and with exquisite tension, while satirizing the workings of the art world as the ultimate con.
 

Genres: Fiction, Crime, Mystery, Noir, Art, Novels, Thriller

176 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

Charles Willeford was a remarkably fine, talented and prolific writer who wrote everything from poetry to crime fiction to literary criticism throughout the course of his impressively long and diverse career. His crime novels are distinguished by a mean'n'lean sense of narrative economy and an admirable dearth of sentimentality. He was born as Charles Ray Willeford III on January 2, 1919 in Little Rock, Arkansas. Willeford's parents both died of tuberculosis when he was a little boy and he subsequently lived either with his grandmother or at boarding schools. Charles became a hobo in his early teens. He enlisted in the Army Air Corps at age sixteen and was stationed in the Philippines. Willeford served as a tank commander with the 10th Armored Division in Europe during World War II. He won several medals for his military service: the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts, and the Luxembourg Croix de Guerre. Charles retired from the army as a Master Sergeant. Willeford's first novel "High Priest of California" was published in 1953. This solid debut was followed by such equally excellent novels as "Pick-Up" (this book won a Beacon Fiction Award), "Wild Wives," "The Woman Chaser," "Cockfighter" (this particular book won the Mark Twain Award), and "The Burnt Orange Heresy." Charles achieved his greatest commercial and critical success with four outstanding novels about hapless Florida homicide detective Hoke Moseley: "Miami Blues," "New Hope for the Dead," "Sideswipe," and "The Way We Die Now." Outside of his novels, he also wrote the short story anthology "The Machine in Ward Eleven," the poetry collections "The Outcast Poets" and "Proletarian Laughter," and the nonfiction book "Something About A Soldier." Willeford attended both Palm Beach Junior College and the University of Miami. He taught a course in humanities at the University of Miami and was an associate professor who taught classes in both philosophy and English at Miami Dade Junior College. Charles was married three times and was an associate editor for "Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine." Three of Willeford's novels have been adapted into movies: Monte Hellman delivered a bleakly fascinating character study with "Cockfighter" (Charles wrote the script and has a sizable supporting role as the referee of a cockfighting tournament which climaxes the picture), George Armitage hit one out of the ballpark with the wonderfully quirky "Miami Blues," and Robinson Devor scored a bull's eye with the offbeat "The Woman Chaser." Charles popped up in a small part as a bartender in the fun redneck car chase romp "Thunder and Lightning." Charles Willeford died of a heart attack at age 69 on March 27, 1988.

Reviews

[Jeffrey Keeten · Rating 5 out of 5]

”The villa on the Riviera had been an anonymous gift to the artist, and he had accepted it in the spirit in which it was offered. No strings attached. He wasn’t well-to-do, but the sale of his Montmartre shop would take care of his expenses for several months. The Paris Soir reporter then asked the obvious question. ‘If you refuse to exhibit or to sell your paintings, how will you live?

‘That,’ Debierue replied, ‘isn’t my concern. An artist has too much work to do to worry about such matters.’ With his mistress clinging to his arm, Debierue climbed into a waiting taxi and was off to the railroad station.”

Jacques Debierue is, without a doubt, the most famous painter in the world who has never sold a painting. No one has seen even a scrap of one of his paintings for decades, and yet the endless speculation about what he is creating has kept the art world atwitter. When James Figueras, ambitious art critic, gets a chance to meet him, he is not only determined to take his picture and get an interview, but to also, at all cost, lay eyes on the man’s work.

James decides to take his “girlfriend” with him, a teacher from Duluth who climbed into his bed while on vacation in Florida and...won’t leave. ”Despite her size, and she was a large woman, Berenice, curled and cramped up in sleep, looked vulnerable to the point of fragility. Her unreasonably long blond lashes swept round flushed cheeks, and her childish face, in repose and without makeup, took several years from her age. Her heavy breasts and big round ass, however, exposed now, as the short flimsy nightgown road high above her hips, were incongruously mature in contrast with her innocent face and tangled Alice-in-Wonderland hair.”

Berenice, for all her annoying aspects, is the artist’s bait. Debierue might be less likely to boot the art critic down the road if the art critic brings something lovely for the artist to admire. James is a serious man, and even though he tries to control every aspect of this historic meeting between a famous painter without a known painting to talk about and the desperate-to-be famous art critic, things get seriously out of hand.

There is a revelation.

There is a fire.

There is an art critic, sitting in a hotel room, painting a picture called The Burnt Orange Heresy.

There is an unexpected murder.

Everything that could possibly go wrong in a James Figueras nightmare does so, including things that he couldn’t even conceive of going wrong in his wildest, most sinister dreams.

In other words, this is a Charles Willeford novel.

I first read Willeford’s novels thirty years ago, but I think I actually have a much greater appreciation reading and rereading his books now than I did then. He’ll make your teeth squeak as you grind your molars together to masticate the hardboiled egg of a plot he has dropped on your plate. And what you are spitting out? That ain’t eggshell; that’s grit, road grit. And that pain in your neck is from the hard left turn plot twists that left you half hanging out of the car and two wheels dangling in the air. And that red sauce on your tie? That ain’t sauce...you just got a little too close to the action.

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[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Willeford has provided us an oddly eccentric and offbeat collection of novels. He wrote crime fiction that doesn’t always feel like crime fiction and offers characters who are odd ducks. Here, the subject is the art world, best epitomized by his description of a gallery owner who didn’t know a thing about art, but was nevertheless successful. The lead character is James Figueras, an art critic out to make a name for himself in the art world though he admits he has few friends on Florida’s Gold Coast as he never picks up the check. James has a lady friend, a large gal who he can’t get rid of, Berenice Hollis. The feeling for him is purely physical and, even that’s not enough, sometimes.

Figueras is contacted by a criminal lawyer who is willing to arrange an interview with the infamous Jacque Debierue, an artist who was his own movement of nihilistic surrealism and who no longer shows his paintings and certainly does not sell them. Debierue is mysterious and hidden like J. D. Salinger. Getting an interview with him would be a high point of Figueras’ career. There is only one catch. Figueras won’t get Debierue’s address unless he agrees to steal a painting for the lawyer.

Figueras has no qualms about stealing the painting or casing the place while the famous artist mixes orange juice for his guests. What qualms? Anything for success. And, indeed, what ultimately happens is all about Figueras’ character and may be more sinister than anything the reader suspects.

Interestingly, in the recent 2019 movie starring Donald Sutherland and Mick Jagger, they changed the name of the painter and his retirement location was moved from Florida to Lake Como, Italy, altering the feel of who the painter had become. Moreover, the film writers completely altered the ending so it is rather different than what Willeford had originally intended. Can't discuss the changes though without falling headfirst into spoiler territory.

[Carla Remy · Rating 5 out of 5]

01/2020

From 1971
This is a remarkable book. All about art history. With a fictional artist, Debierue, and his fictional movement, Nihilistic Surrealism. This novel is so completely entertaining in every detail, that I forgot to expect there to be a murder. There is.
Willeford wrote many books,from the 1950s to the 1980s. They are rarely the same.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Never let a thing’s worth obscure its value”--Cassidy, a prominent Manhattan art dealer

Having read the four novels comprising the whole series of Charles Willeford’s Hoke Mosely eighties Miami cop series, I thought I would check this out, because I heard it might be his best, I heard it was very different, more noir and perhaps harkening back to his early roots in pulpy noir, and I knew there was a film loosely based on it featuring Donald Sutherland, Elizabeth Debicki, Claes Bang, and.. . . Mick Jagger!

Jaime (also known as James) Figueras is a highly ambitious art critic (and if you have read Macbeth, you may have some idea of how much luck may come to the excessively ambitious). Prominent art and also ambitious dealer Cassidy knows Figueras is both ambitious and broke, so he suggests a (shady) deal. He reveals he is helping hide a reclusive painter in a house near Miami, none other than French painter Jacques Debierue! (Think reclusive novelist Thomas Pynchon, if Pynchon had also written almost nothing, which is not true). James is promised the first interview with an American critic and a break-through article published IF he will steal one of his paintings. That’s the set up, act one.

Since we hate the ambitious, arrogant art critic, and nothing really happens for half the book, it is not such a great mystery. But I’d say this is less mystery and more of a dark satirical send-up of the art world--dealing, criticism, greed, power, shallow people, and so on. Oh, there is a murder, and theft, and arson, but the greatest crime in the book for Willeford--who also wrote art criticism, and was an art major in college--is the art world’s reverence for surrealism and dadaism, folks like DuChamp, all of which Willeford perceives as just an art scam. All intellectual pretension. Nothing to do with art and everything to do with the cynical shallowness of the art world. Jacques Debierue is known as a “nihilistic surrealist” and while we have none of his work in any gallery or museum, is all the more prized for his reclusiveness and lack of proof that he is an artist.

I’m kind of torn how to rate this. From the set-up in the first act you know how this is going to end: Badly. The chapter of Figueras lecturing Berenice on art is part of the satire, but it's still a slog. The actual crimes, and there are a few, all happen near the end, in the last quarter of the book, though they do fit the almost Calvinistic expectation for noir, that bad things will happen to bad people. But the writing is good, dark, pulpy, as we get to despise almost everyone along the way. Nasty. But not surprising. I’ll say 3.5 and go either way when I post.

You need Berenice in this novel because at one point what the Duluth native sees very clearly for us is that all these art guys are shallow, greedy, jerks. She's us. Berenice is slammed by her boyfriend Figueras for being a stupid, midwestern girl, but as it turns out in almost every Willeford book, women are just better and smarter than any of the men. That's interesting, though she is also not particularly admirable, either.

Here’s a link to the official trailer to the 2020 film version, which I heard was not very good, and set in Italy not Miami, and gets the tone of Willeford all wrong, but I still might take a look at it because of Jagger and Sutherland:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PMAl...

[Kirk · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best Willeford---better even than Miami Blues, which is fun and clever but familiar and makes me think way too hard about the utter furriness of Alec Baldwin's chest hair c. 1990. What I love about BOH is what I love about the best of literary pulp: it finds a way to erase the high culture/low culture divide. Suffice to say, the hero here is an art critic, ambitious, underhanded, entirely comfortable with his greedy-seediness. The story makes you think how much more fun and interesting Edmund Wilson, Kenneth Rexroth, and even Rex Reed would be if they were homicidal maniacs. I'm sure there's a book somewhere about the specific aesthetic theory Willeford employs throughout the narrative, but I'll leave it to others to explore that. Just rest assured if you know even a smitch about Marcel Duchamp and subsequent 1920s Dada/surrealism you'll get a chuckle out of some of the descriptions of the old master painter's work. Who knew so much could be made out of a nail hole, which comes to serve as a significant plot pivot? There are those who say the plot slags a bit in the middle, but when the critic breaks bad the pace more than picks up. Great noir climax set in the Everglades and starring a tire jack, and an interesting denouement that suggests critics do have a conscience and therefore are people too. One wishes Willeford were around to write the definitive GoodReads noir novel. It's time.

[Andy Weston · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a big Willeford fan, and yet it was a surprise to me that as well as being a writer, he was a painter as well. Other than his Hoke Moseley novels, this may be the most famous of his other work, though that accolade comes, most likely, because of the film adaptation of 2019.
I really enjoyed it, but I don’t think it’s the best of the rest of his output, by any means (for me, Pick-Up and Cockfighter).

James Figueras is a little known art critic, though he has managed to get a posting to Palm Beach but he's burdened with dim prospects and an annoying girlfriend, Berenice Hollis. Nonetheless, he is on the lookout for his big break and it comes when he receives information that one of the most influential, but enigmatic, artists of the Twentieth Century has moved to Florida, one Jacques Debierue. A big collector offers to tell him where to find the him, but only if he will steal one of the artist's works in exchange for the location.

It’s more than just a well written crime novel though, Willeford delivers a satirical take on Modern Art and the pseudo-intellectual theories that led to its beginning.

It’s also got that Willeford touch, an unexpected dark twist delivered in a deadpan manner that makes you doubt you read what you actually did, and go back and read it again, several times..

[Stephen Goldenberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read Charles Willeford’s four Hoke Mosely novels many years ago and thought they were among the best crime novels I’d ever read and, in the case of ‘Sideswipe ‘ simply one of the best novels. So, I decided to catch up with some of his other books. This one was interesting but somewhat disappointing after his detective novels. It’s about a young art critic and his obsession with a mysterious French avant-garde painter. Most of the book consists of conversations about art and artistic movements. The explosive, dramatic ending seems to belong to a different novel.

[WJEP · Rating 4 out of 5]

James Figueras is to modern art criticism as Frank Mansfield is to cockfighting.

But this is not just a story of a shrewd selfish fanatic. This is a suspenseful spoof. Somewhere in Part 1, readers will begin to get the joke modern art is a swindle. But Willeford remains deadpan throughout. I think Willeford might have been in favor of the Entartete Kunst exhibition.

[TheBookWarren · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.50 Stars (Rnd ⬆️) — Willeford is just such a marvel. That’s my takeout from this novel of complexity that somehow boasts both brute-force & sharp-incision-dissection.

Very different from say ‘Shark infested Custard’, BOH is a novel about the choices we make & those who foolishly believe they do t need to lay in the beds they make. Our protagonist is both sharp-witted whilst simultaneously being a near total dullard. An art critic, he is hellbent on making a name for himself in the art world outside of his criticism. The arc here is tried and true — Extraordinary circumstances occur to enable the character to confront their own legacy, to make more of what life has mashed form their experiences & flung back at them with a singular spoil of bittersweet spoils.

Willeford writes brilliantly and deflects the standard consequences slowing the reader to illuminate whatever they so wish of the end result of it all. Befriending a famous reclusive artist — whom despite feeling like a cliche initially, proves anything but — via a pompous collector, our central character is left to make a swift but incredibly vicious decision that will shake him as a person and as a memory. Or so he thinks. The brilliance here is that them little did he know the he whom he becomes was te he he always was. Excellent reading.

[Kaplumbağa Felsefecisi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kitap sanat eleştirmeni olduğunu söyleyen ve hayatını gayet sanat kaygısı içerisinde idame ettiren bir adamın hayatını anlatırken, Ayrıntı Yayınları'nın kara ayrıntı dizisine yakışır şekilde yavaş yavaş gerilimin tırmandığı ve hırsların ön plana çıktığı bir seyre dönüşür.

"Hayatının dörtte üçünü dünyadan uzaklaşıp kabuğuna çekilerek geçirmiş her sanatçı ya sürrealisttir ya da deli."
"Üç ressam bir kahvede buluşup geceyarısına kadar dostça tartıştıktan sonra bir hizip kurmaya karar veriyor, gecenin şarap ve fikir yüklü geç saatlerinde bir sayfa kağıda manifestolarını çiziktiriyorlar, gün doğduğunda birbirlerinden nefret ediyorlardı."

[W.B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I remember reading this book because the poet Michael Weaver (not the well-known poet Michael Weaver but another Michael Weaver from San Diego) spoke so highly of the author.

So I read the book.

Then I too spoke highly of this author.

When a really smart writer takes on a genre populated by mostly cloneish writers, magic happens.

This author makes magic happen...over and over.

Dark. Brill. Great summer reading.

[Darwin8u · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great noir novel that seems a mix of Willeford's sunny, Florida Noir, and Patricia Highsmith art antics. A book about art, art criticism, ambition, fraud, and collusion. Sometimes, the only thing that matters is having your fame outlive you.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book starts out a little slow. A lot of the first act is the narrator/protagonist, an art critic trying to break into the big time, musing on the nature of art criticism and the role it plays as a service, not just to consumers and patrons of art, but the artists themselves. It’s not as boring as it sounds. He takes a pretty dense piece of subject matter and breaks it down into pretty simple lay terms, even using sports analogies. I wasn’t entirely sure if he was satirizing critics or dispatching his own critical manifesto through the narrator. The latter is probably unlikely given that the narrator believes artist and critic should maintain defined roles: critics shouldn’t make art, and artists shouldn’t write criticism. Of course, in real life, in addition to being a writer, soldier, horse trainer, and amateur boxer, Willeford was also a painter and an art critic—hardly a man who believed in singular obsession.

Hang in there. The first act sets up a pretty riveting second and third act, and what may have seemed long-winded and pretentious is actually very clever foreshadowing. After putting this book down, I realized it was a very lean, concise thriller. It was also smart and informative. Without giving too much away, the narrator finds himself compromising each of his previously stated professional ethics one by one until finally he passes a point of no return. Like a lot of Willeford’s novels, there’s a female accessory to the protagonist, a somewhat ditzy but attractive girlfriend. But in the third act, she proves rather perceptive, doing a surprisingly good job of putting the facts together. The narrator’s underestimations of her intelligence drive the plot to its climax, which is dark, brutal, and sparingly well-written in a compelling way, a Charles Willeford trademark.

[Lobstergirl · Rating 3 out of 5]

This short little book is divided into three parts. Not until Part II did a plot come into existence; Part I was mostly the douchebaggy art critic protagonist explaining condescendingly and at length modern art movements to his girlfriend. "Berenice had a minimal interest...in anything that bordered on abstract thought..." The second two parts involve the art critic's plot with an art collector to hoodwink a famous elderly artist. Crimes are committed.

The book dates to 1971 and is strikingly misogynistic. We're told that "Berenice ran awkwardly, like most women..."

We're told repeatedly that Berenice is big. She's "large" and "strapping." "Despite her size, and she was a large woman...." She was a "big, marvelous woman." "She was a big woman." "She was amusing when she tried to be coy because she was so big."

Now, you're probably wondering: HOW big is Berenice?

Berenice is, wait for it....

140 pounds.

[Tracie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the first Willeford book that I've read that was a bit of a dud to me (not counting the collection of posthumously published short stories). It starts slow, the middle is slow, the end is sort of exciting for like 3 pages, and then it's all slow again. I could not stand the narrator. And unlike with most of Willeford's other protagonists (none of whom are all that likeable) I couldn't find one aspect of Figueras that I could tolerate. I would not ever want to be in the same room as that dude, lest I get stuck listening to him pontificate about contemporary art, which--SPOILER ALERT--is what he does for the entire novel. SHUT UP YOU ARE BORING. I think maybe if he would have been developed a bit more into perhaps a Harvey Pekar-type I could have related to him a bit more. Not that one should ever really relate to Willeford's characters, but at least he'd be more well rounded and less of a droning asshole.

The exciting three pages are good, but still not great, and not nearly enough to save this, although good enough to get it 2 stars versus 1. Also, the actual ending? HATED IT.

And, seriously, Willeford, can I get like one female character who isn't deplorable? At this point, I'm not even asking for a strong female character, just one who does something aside from drink, have sex, ask annoying questions, and get in the way.

I think I'm more of a fan of Willeford's later stuff. I like the ultra violence. And I like a crime gotten away with from time to time. And, yes, goddamnit, I like Hoke Moseley.

[Tim · Rating 2 out of 5]

eh. Willeford sounded intriguing from some review I stumbled upon, and this was described as "his best book." I hope not.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A noir novel about the amoral world of art scholarship. In Charles Willeford's The Burnt Orange Heresy tells of art critic James Figueras who needs more cash than his writing gigs pay him -- but who doesn't want to go back to teaching. So with the help of a rich art collector, he sidles up to a French painter who has relocated to South Florida. This artist is unusual in that he doesn't like exhibiting his work to anyone. Figueras's task is to steal one of the painter's recent canvases for the collector. Surprises, however, are in store regarding the recent work; and his visit to the painter in company with his girlfriend Berenice leads to some interesting and very noir developments.

[Ademption · Rating 4 out of 5]

Willeford wrote this noir about an art critic trying to advance his career by taking advantage of a hermetic artist. The artist has built a juggernaut reputation on rarely exhibiting his work. The elements are goofy but the tone is dark deadpan. Instead of guns, dames, drugs, and jewels, Willeford's characters jockey for galleries, graduate school grants, art history articles, critical and artistic reputations with the intensity of mobsters and PIs. The book reminded me of Pynchon, though with far less characters; however, Willeford has a formalist determination to play the noir all the way to the end with a straight face without using silly songs as levity to break the tension. The tension persists throughout the book, and art criticism becomes a bleak business.

Reasons why I think the book is currently OOP:

1. dated descriptions of technology: early Polaroid cameras, flashcubes, typewriters. (Note to self, if ever I write, stay away from extended descriptions of new technology).

2. dated clothing: jumpsuits, bell bottoms. (Though I liked the 70s atmosphere).

3. One would have to have a grounding in noir in order to appreciate that Willeford used silly elements and yet stayed true to tone and form. So, actual noir gets printed before joke-noir or meta-satiric noir.

[Johnny · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nasty, little gem. As much a commentary on criticism and art as a character study and dark thriller.

A lot of times when a writer attempts to delve into an exotic arena (in this case, the art world), even with research, the setting can come off more as how the writer wants the art world to be or how he/she thinks it is (This is best illustrated by the "punk rock" episode of "T.J. Hooker". The 50 year-old writer had obviously read an article in time on "punkers" and used that as the entire basis for his representation, failing miserably).

So when you read a book where the writer is obviously someone writing within an arena they know, the detail and depth glows. Who knew that Willeford had a thesis on the nature of art criticism in him?

This is also the best written book, purely in terms of language, that I have read by Willeford. Spare, but descriptive. Poetic, yet stern.

Deserves to be consideredthe classic that it is.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

An odd book. Jacques Figueras is an art critic willing to do pretty much anything to rise in the art world. When he gets a chance to interview a notoriously reclusive painter (so long as he can steal of his painting), he more than jumps at the chance, but that interview doesn't turn out quick like he though it would, and some strange events follow it. Could have been good, though I was not very interested in the parts of the book about this painter's history. You can see where it's going, but still the last part of it is very interesting. Willeford wrote many more interesting books.

[Nursebookie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my first Charles Willeford book and because of this book, he will be included as one of my favorite mystery and thriller authors for writing this neo-noir femme fatale murder mystery set in the art world, that is now a major motion picture by Sony Pictures Classics.

The Burnt Orange Heresy is a classic book about greed, ambition and obsession - a play on the human psyche on what motivates people to risk it all only to gain power, fame, and fortune. This is a quick read that is written in three parts. This book was simply irresistible and moved fast - so fast the crime is a gut wrenching punch. Each of the characters were developed well and in a short book, delivered a tight plot that will keep you guessing.

I highly recommend this book and then watch the movie too because it was absolutely fascinating.

[Dave Newman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this years ago and loved it, as I do most of the Willeford I've read. They finally made it into a film, which had been in pre-production for years. The film was very average, save for Mick Jagger who was excellent as a creepy art dealer, and made me think I'd mis-remembered the plot of the book. I hadn't. The book is still a brilliant character study with keen insights into crime and the art world, and the writing is some of Willeford's best. If you're interested in the consequences of success, read this one.

[Matt Raymond · Rating 1 out of 5]

My coworker found this book, the only library copy of it in the State of Massachusetts, and loved it. The plot, about art critic James Figueras who sets out to meet and criticize the work of a mysterious artist told in a detective noir style, sounded interesting enough. It’s a short 190 pages, and I’ve always wanted to read a Charles Willeford book. So I read it, waited for something to happen, and nothing does. It’s not easy for me to hate things, but this books is the easiest to hate. It’s begging for me to hate it.

Told from James’ perspective, the book suffers a lot because of it. He is an interesting, fleshed out character who is horrible. The stereotype of every art critic in fiction. He says fancy things, they are never as enlightening as he thinks and his voice adds absolutely nothing. I don’t normally complain about characters being unlikable, but he is too much to handle even for 190 pages. He’s just not interesting. Nothing he does, says or thinks actually makes any sense to the audience, because he is trying to sound more important than he is. While that is the point of his narration, he spends most of the time explaining things the audience already knows. I’ve never been talked down in a crime story, so this is baffling to me. Full chapters of him explaining his motive, his plans, his concerns, etc. ALL of them obvious to anyone who reads this, but he’s got to tell us in his stupid pseudo-intellectual jargon. Doesn’t that sound like fun?

There’s one early chapter where he explains to his girlfriend, Berenice Hollis, that art criticism is like a scientist telling us how big a baby whale is. Umm what? No, it’s not at all. A whale is a tangible thing. It’s weight and length are measured. Those things are facts. Art, any art, is subjective. You can’t criticize it accurately because nobody sees art the same. They are based on lots of different, contradictory critical theories. THEORIES. A measurement isn’t a theory! It’s a something that is proven. So that whole speech immediately told me this book was a waste of time. And that was early on. It only got worse. And to go back to Berenice, she is completely useless, James spends every moment of the book complaining about her but drags her along anyway, and their relationship leads to the most predictable ending ever. Another reason not to read this.

The elusive painter at the center of the story, Jacques Debierue, is made to be the leader of a brief movement that bridged Dadaism with Surrealism called Nihilistic Surrealism: isn’t that the most pretentious, hipster bullshit art movement name ever made up? It sounds like the genre of The Big Lebowski (a movie which does a much better job of exploiting and satirizing art movements than this book ever could), but taken to a level so over-inflated that if this book were a mylar balloon it would have floated up into the atmosphere, popped, and disintegrated by the time I finish typing this stupid analogy.

I would like to like this book. I tried. But nothing happens for over half the book! The things that people called “twists” in the book were just obvious to me, and nothing about this felt exciting. You want to know what does happen? A lot of talking and set up until something actually happens on (approximately) page 140 out of 190. I read and love books that are steeped in the post-modern school of rambling, but this isn’t my cuppa. The Claire DeWitt crime series does a great job at having close to no plot or logical point, but presents its ideas without rambly speeches or throwing in insular logic that doesn’t matter to anything. This book is more focused on impressing me with an over 20 page chapter/lecture on art history in order to tear all those things down than allowing a story to organically introduce those topics. It explains, then makes fun of, the concept of art criticism so many times, that the intended response can’t actually happen. It’s all too obvious about manipulating my perspective. When I can see what a writer is doing, when I can feel their words trying to force a thought in my head, then you aren’t actually writing a novel just a speech about a topic only you care about.

[Stephen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is OMG good!

The perfect mystery novel about art. Anyone who would ever consider writing a mystery about art, painters, the history of art, the sub-sub-culture of art criticism, or any given art scene in general, should pick up this book and realize that the best possible book about the subject has already been written by the late, great Charles Willeford.

This was one of the few books I have ever read twice. I usually figure life if too short to travel the same path more than once, but in this case I find it was a worthwhile use of time. Probably one of the only books I would EVER consider reading a third time.

Strongest possible recommendation. Seek it out, you'll be hooked in no time.

[Brad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Been meaning to read this one for a while. It fits in my back pocket, so I thought it would be good to take on my trip to Monterey/Big Sur. Charles Willeford is continually fascinating as a writer. There is nothing flashy about this book at all, but it is fantastic. His characters can always rationalize any ridiculous or insane action. This book's protagonist is no exception to that rule. Perhaps the most interested thing of all to me in Willeford's late writings (say this one and the Hoke Moseley stuff) is his characters' insistence on wearing jumpsuits. I don't know, that's just weird and wonderful to me. Apparently, they are very handy to wear and comfortable. Definitely a great, short read from a master of American fiction.

[Freddie the Know-it-all · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mein Artf

When I hear the word "art", I reach for my revolver.

Few things make me as homicidal and Death Kampfy as much as art. Any kind of art.

It is a magnet for layabouts, losers, and lunatics. The instant it comes up as a topic, 24-karat bullshit is all you'll hear.

If I had my way, I'd ship every artist to Artschwitz, nail them under the floorboards, and take away their ballpoint pens.

[J. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This would get five stars if I had read it more recently.
A complete re-configuration of standard noir / pulp structure & plot-- but with all the elements of the classic framework.
Everything feels normal and regular, a faithful recreation of the banal world, until it doesn't anymore ... a Maltese Penguin, perhaps.

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars loved all of this. Just read kirk’s review; it explains all in a perfect way. I think it helps if you’re an artist or an art lover which is the only reason I knocked off a half a star, I am both of those but even so he got a little crazy detailed..but still, it just takes you away into another time, place and mind.

[Valerie · Rating 2 out of 5]

possibly the most misogynistic book i have ever read

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a mystery as much as a savage satirical attack on the modern art business, art criticism, modern art movements.

Fun to read.