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Still Lives by Maria Hummel
Jan. 9th, 2019 11:27 pmThe Blurb On The Back:
Kim Lord’s face looked back at me, disguised in paint and the features of a murdered woman.
Revered artist Kim Lord is about to unveil her most shocking show yet: Still Lives, a series of self-portraits in which she impersonates the female victims of America’s most famous homicides, from Nicole Brown Simpson to the Black Dahlia.
As celebrities and rich patrons pour into L.A.’s Rocque Museum for the opening night, the attendees wait eagerly for Kim’s arrival. All except Maggie Richter, museum editor and ex-girlfriend of Greg Shaw Ferguson, Kim’s new boyfriend. But Kim never shows up to her party and the crowd’s impatience slowly turns to unease.
When Greg is arrested on suspicion of murder, it seems that life is imitating art. Has Kim suffered the same fate as the women in her paintings? As Maggie is drawn into an investigation of her own, she uncovers dark and deadly truths that will change her life forever …
( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )
The Verdict:
Maria Hummel’s literary thriller is a love letter to Los Angeles that’s strong in its observations of the modern art world and its inhabitants but the mystery element quickly tails off under the weight of Maggie’s backstory and the final quarter falls apart as she makes leaps of deduction based on a knowledge of the other characters that isn’t previously shared on the page, concluding with an overblown denouement that made me roll my eyes
STILL LIVES was released in the United Kingdom on 1st November 2018. Thanks to the Amazon Vine Programme for the review copy of this book.
Revered artist Kim Lord is about to unveil her most shocking show yet: Still Lives, a series of self-portraits in which she impersonates the female victims of America’s most famous homicides, from Nicole Brown Simpson to the Black Dahlia.
As celebrities and rich patrons pour into L.A.’s Rocque Museum for the opening night, the attendees wait eagerly for Kim’s arrival. All except Maggie Richter, museum editor and ex-girlfriend of Greg Shaw Ferguson, Kim’s new boyfriend. But Kim never shows up to her party and the crowd’s impatience slowly turns to unease.
When Greg is arrested on suspicion of murder, it seems that life is imitating art. Has Kim suffered the same fate as the women in her paintings? As Maggie is drawn into an investigation of her own, she uncovers dark and deadly truths that will change her life forever …
( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )
The Verdict:
Maria Hummel’s literary thriller is a love letter to Los Angeles that’s strong in its observations of the modern art world and its inhabitants but the mystery element quickly tails off under the weight of Maggie’s backstory and the final quarter falls apart as she makes leaps of deduction based on a knowledge of the other characters that isn’t previously shared on the page, concluding with an overblown denouement that made me roll my eyes
STILL LIVES was released in the United Kingdom on 1st November 2018. Thanks to the Amazon Vine Programme for the review copy of this book.
