Jeffrey Archer was educated at Oxford University. He has served five years in Britain's House of Commons and fourteen years in the House of Lords. All of his novels and short story collections--including And Thereby Hangs a Tale, Kane and Abel, and Paths of Glory--have been international bestselling books. Archer is married with two sons and lives in London and Cambridge.
Having barely escaped the burning Twin Towers, Anna Petrescu takes advantage of being presumed dead to tease out the connection between an old lady's murder in England and the theft of a Van Gogh. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Even though Archer (Sons of Fortune) grounds his international art-thievery thriller in the events of 9/11, this leisurely paced, tepid effort has a musty feel. It's September 10, 2001, and Lady Victoria Wentworth is sitting in spacious Wentworth Hall considering the sad state of family fortunes when a female intruder slips in, slashes her throat and cuts off her ear. The next day in New York, art expert Anna Petrescu heads to her job as art wrangler for wealthy magnate Bryce Fenston of Fenston Finance. The pair's offices are in the Twin Towers, and when disaster strikes, each sees the tragedy as an opportunity to manipulate a transaction scheduled to transfer ownership of a legendary Van Gogh painting, Self-portrait with Bandaged Ear, from the Wentworth estate to the larcenous Fenston. The initially intriguing character, hit-woman and ex-gymnast Olga Krantz, turns out to be too lightweight, both physically and fictionally, to garner strong interest in anything other than her deadly skills with a kitchen knife. Lord Archer has been busy for the past five years or so serving half of a four-year prison sentence for perjury and writing a series of books about his prison experience; his first novel in seven years disappoints. (Mar.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
"Archer is back in top form with [this] latest thriller." --Library Journal (starred review) "Thoroughly imagined...entertaining...thrilling." --Denver Post "Murder and a high-stakes art-world theft are cleverly blended [in this] exciting...global thrill-ride." --Vancouver Sun "Sail along from one high crime to the next....Archer is a great plotter....[and] in the middle of the action, [he] drops research gems." --Liz Smith, New York Post
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