The Optickal Illusion: A Novel [Hardcover]

Packed with intrigue,This tale of an art con, based on a true event, reads like an eighteenth-century version of?Eloquent and captivating.Halliburton adroitly satirizes the political machinations of Georgian London and explores issues of authenticity and originality as they relate to artistic creation. . . The novels expansive, colorful canvas contains many delights, particularly for those interested in art history and theory.Written with a detail and often a lyricism that makes me go back and rereadfor the pleasure of it. I am drawn into the history and vibrancy of color asnever before. I see more intensely, and that is a great gift to have been given.A remarkable true story of vanity and delusion, which Halliburton turnsinto a gripping and only partly fictional whodunnit . . . brings the artistsand their art to colorful life and brushes in streaks of feminism, via MaryWollstonecraft, as well as dark shadows of the French Revolution.A bold and determined woman struggles to forge her identity in a world where women figure only in the background of events. Halliburton's debut is a vibrant portrait of an age of political?and artistic revolution as well as a gripping story.Utterly absorbing . . . Halliburton builds up the layers of deception,ambition, and scandal into a shimmering, fully textured portrait of GeorgianLondon with all its gloss, dross, glamour, and corruption.The research is impeccable. The reader becomes totally immersed in the society and culture of the time: clothes, speech, idioms, descriptions of place all serve to help the reader imagine the scenes. Key themes are the nature of art, the question of identity, and the role of women, specifically how female artists have been painted out of history, denied recognition despite talent. Of course, this is a theme which is very much still resonant today. . . . A novel to?savor . . . [for] fans?who enjoyed literary novels such as Eleanor Cattons?The stunning debut novel brimming withenvy, lulCˆ