The Raphael Affair

Iain Pears

Very entertaining book with loads of subtle and not so subtle humor. An old school detective novel in the good sense of the word. Witty characters, bit clumsy heroes and charming "bad" guys set to a very lively and realistic described Roman décor.

What is it about? An alleged lost painting of Raphael suddenly turns up under suspicious circumstances. Is it a real Raphael or not? That is the question that needs to be answered. Loads of stuff happens, the painting is sold for a tremendous amount of money to the National Museum in Italy. A famous painting forger dies. Jonathan Argyll a young art historian writing his paper about Mantini (a not so famous Italian painter) figures out that the Raphael might be a fake with help of some old Victorian letters (which are very funny), but how can he prove it?

Then the Raphael is set on fire and gets destroyed almost completely. Lots of suspects including our friend Argyll. The Italian Art Theft Unit (this is my translation out of Dutch, please correct me if I'm wrong) led by General Bottando, has a big problem finding the one who did it, why it's been done and trying to keep their head above water getting very bad press! Flavia di Stefano (of the Art Theft Unit) and Argyll are trying to find the "real" Raphael, to prove the one destroyed a fake. The museum director resigns, one of his employees gets killed, Flavia and Argyll head of for London to find evidence etc. All is woven to a catchy plot with a fun twist at the end. Of course all ends well… or doesn't it?

A real fun intelligent and entertaining read, highly recommended for a nice relaxing in between more serious reading. For it's genre I rate it ****1/2