The Last Painting of Sara de Vos

. . . worthy of comparison to Tracy Chevalier's Girl with a Pearl Earring and Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch . . . A masterly, multilayered story that will dazzle readers. Library Journal (starred review)

In 1631, Sara de Vos is admitted to the Guild of St. Luke in Holland as a master painter, the first woman to be so honoured. Three hundred years later, only one work attributed to de Vos is known to remain—a haunting winter scene, At the Edge of a Wood, which hangs over the Manhattan bed of a wealthy descendant of the original owner. An Australian grad student, Ellie Shipley, struggling to stay afloat in New York, agrees to paint a forgery of the landscape, a decision that will haunt her. Because now, half a century later, she's curating an exhibition of female Dutch painters, and both versions threaten to arrive.

As the three threads intersect with increasing and exquisite suspense, The Last Painting of Sara de Vos mesmerises while it grapples with the demands of the artistic life, showing how the deceits of the past can forge the present.

Deeply researched, beautifully written, intellectually absorbing novel that also has the qualities of a page-turner . . . tremendous story of art, deception, love, ambition, and the place of women in the world, and in history. From the opening pages you know you are in the hands of a writer at the top of his game.
Stephen Romei, The Australian

This beautiful novel is a gift . . . a seductive, rewarding read.
Kerryn Goldsworthy, The Advertiser

This densely layered, finely wrought book is a delight. The characters are complex and believable, the story compelling, the writing simply beautiful. Australian Financial Review