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Booklists

Lists of books, many of which received at least one starred review (indicating a work of unusual merit) from the following review sources: Booklist , Publisher's Weekly (PW), Kirkus and Library Journal (LJ). Additional titles of interest may be included on the lists. Titles are generally listed alphabetically by author.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Overbooked specializes in providing timely information about fiction (all genres) and readable nonfiction. Overbooked has been online since 1994. Overbooked is a work in progress . . .

Overbooked is the winner of the 2008 Louis Shores - Greenwood Publishing Award: to recognize excellence in book reviewing and other media for libraries. The award recipient is selected for significant achievement related to a reviewing process that helps librarians make selection decisions.

Booklists and Suggested Reading

Nazi Art Theft Booklist

 

Page Modified: August 19, 2008

Novels and Nonfiction - all genres.

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Annotations are from Advance, the Ingram Book Magazine, unless noted.

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• The Amber Room
  Author: Berry, Steve
  Publisher: Ballantine $ 24.95 ISBN: 0345460030 Date: 2003
  Forged of the exquisite gem, the Amber Room is one of the greatest treasures ever made by man--and the subject of one of history's most intriguing mysteries. Seized by the Nazis from Russia in 1941, the Room was hidden and has not been seen since. But now the hunt begins once more.
  Updated 5.21.07
• A Sudden Change of Heart
  Author: Bradford, Barbara Taylor
  Publisher: Doubleday $ 24.95 ISBN: 038549274X Date: 1999
  A gripping tale by the author of A Woman of Substance. The lives of two women--best friends since childhood--intersect in a way they could never imagine when one of them investigates artwork stolen by the Nazis and uncovers shattering secrets about the family connections of her friend's ex-husband.
  Updated 5.21.07
• Loot
  Author: Elkins, Aaron
  Publisher: William Morrow Price: $ 24 ISBN: 0688159273 Date: 1999
  Booklist
  April 1945: The Nazis, nearing defeat, frantically work to hide a huge store of looted art treasures. Fifty years later, in a seedy Boston pawnshop, ex-curater Ben Revere makes a stunning discovery among the piles of junk. But with the find come decades of secrets, rancor and lies.
  
• Cold Hit
  Author: Fairstein, Linda
  Publisher: Scribner List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0684848465 Date: 1999
  PW
  The mysterious death of a wealthy art collector leads Assistant D.A. Alexandra Cooper and NYPD detectives Mike Chapman and Mercer Wallace on a quest for clues that takes them behind the scenes at glitzy East Side auction houses, to top-level police meetings, and into courtrooms, where justice does not always prevail.
  Sugggested Reading List: Legal Stars
• Blood Money
  Author: Krich, Rochelle Majer
  Publisher: Twilight Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0380973790 Date: 1999
  PW
  Driven by the recently acquired knowledge that she is descended from victims of the Nazis, LAPD homicide detective Jessica Drake unravels a twisted plot that leads her to mysterious deaths among Holocaust survivors.
• Amber Beach
  Author: Lowell, Elizabeth
  Publisher: Morrow $ 22 ISBN: 0380973170 Date: 1997
  The incomparable "New York Times" bestselling author creates a startling new contemporary romance of heart-stopping suspense. When a young woman sets out to find her wayward brother who has been trafficking in stolen amber, she is soon facing dangerous and ruthless enemies.
  Updated 5.31.07
• Provenance
  Author: MacDonald, Frank
  Publisher: Little Brown ISBN: 0316555525 Date: 1980
  Updated 5.31.07
• The Pieces from Berlin
  Author: Pye, Michael
  Publisher: Knopf $ 24 ISBN: 0375414363 Date: 2003
  Kirkus
  From the author of Taking Lives comes a riveting new novel, inspired by an actual historical figure, about a woman who made a fortune trafficking stolen art in wartime Berlin, and the terrible emotional consequences of her crimes.
  Updated 12.02.02
• The Museum Guard
  Author: Norman, Howard
  Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0374216495 Date: 1998
  Kirkus
  When the famous Dutch painting Jewess on a Street in Amsterdam arrives at a museum in Halifax, a disturbed young woman abandons her life in favor of the one she imagines for the painting's subject --even as being a Jew in Amsterdam becomes more perilous as the clouds of World War II gather in Europe.
  Suggested Reading: Historical Fiction Stars
• Trojan Gold
  Author: Peters, Elizabeth
  Publisher: Atheneum $ 15.95 ISBN: 0689116217 Date: 1979
  Art historian Vicky Bliss gets possession of a photo of a woman dressed in the legendary golden jewels of Troy. The gold disappeared at the end of World War II, yet the picture is recent. When she finds blood stains on an enclosed envelope, Vicky is willing to risk danger to search for the lost Trojan Gold.
  Updated 5.21.07
• The Chrysalis
  Author: Terrell, H.B.
  Publisher: Ballantine $ 21.95 ISBN: 9780345494665 Date: 2007
  Kirkus
  An international thriller that spans centuries, this stunning debut traces a mysterious Dutch masterpiece through the clutches of the Nazis and into the dark underbelly of today's art world.
  Suggested Reading: Debuts
  Updated 10.25.06
• Girl in Hyacinth Blue
  Author: Vreeland, Susan
  Publisher: McMurray & Beck List Price: $ 17.50 ISBN: 1878448900 Date: 1999
  PW Kirkus Booklist
  The ownership of a supposed Vermeer painting is traced back to the moment of its inspiration; and as the painting moves through each owner's hands, what was long hidden or forgotten or repressed quietly surfaces. Like Vermeer's paintings, this bestselling novel illuminates the poignantly dear moments in people's lives.
  Suggested Reading: Vermeer Stars | All Stars
• The Lost Van Gogh
  Author: Zerries, A.J.
  Publisher: Forge $ 24.95 ISBN: 0765312506 Date: 2006
  A Van Gogh painting stolen during World War II mysteriously appears at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. While investigating the painting's past to determine its true owner, NYPD Major Case Squad detective Clay Ryder becomes obsessed with the mystery surrounding the thief who first stole it.
  Updated 5.21.07

Nonfiction

• Treasure Hunt: A New York Times Reporter Tracks the Quedlinburg Hoard
  Author: Honan, William
  Publisher: Fromm $ 24.95 ISBN: 0880641746 Date: 1997
  PW
  Nearly half a century after the end of World War II, the famous and priceless Quedlinburg treasures were still missing. The Nazis had commandeered this magnificent hoard of medieval artworks and had hidden it in a cave on the outskirts of Quedlinburg - a quaint, cobblestone-paved village in central Germany. But soon after victorious American troops occupied Germany in April 1945, twelve of the treasures - worth more than $200 million in today's market - were found to have suddenly disappeared. For years after, the Quedlinburg case was known as the greatest and longest unsolved art theft of the century. Then, in 1989, William H. Honan, a senior reporter at The New York Times hungry for a high profile case, and Willi Korte, a colorful, wise-cracking German researcher, set out to track down the thief. It began to look like a hopeless task. After so many years, the trail had grown cold, and it seemed as if, should they be lucky enough to discover him, the thief might be ready to kill in order to protect his priceless booty. As the investigators scrutinized the art world and delved into old U.S. Army records, they gathered clues and suspects - some of them more than a little frightening. Then, after a series of hair-raising adventures, Honan made headlines around the world by identifying the thief and leading law enforcement authorities to a desolate, tumble-down farm town in northeastern Texas where the treasures had been hidden. Subsequently, Honan was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in investigative journalism. - Publisher Marketing
  Updated 5.21.07
• Museum of the Missing: A History of Art Theft
  Author: Houpt, Simon
  Publisher: Sterling $ 24.95 ISBN: 1402728298 Date: 2006
  LJ
  Houpt offers an intriguing tour through the underworld of art theft, where the stakes are high and passions run strong. Not only is this volume beautifully written and lavishly illustrated, it tells a story as fascinating as any crime novel.
  Updated 5.21.07
• Lost and Found: Heinrich Schliemann and the Gold That Got Away
  Author: Moorehead, Caroline
  Publisher: Viking $ 24.95 ISBN: 0670856797 Date: 1996
  Booklist
  One of the enduring stories of the last century--now front-page news again the world over--is the astounding 1873 discovery by the first modern archaeologist, Heinrich Schliemann, of the lost gold of Priam, king of ancient Troy. Here journalist and biographer Caroline Moorehead explores Schliemann's extraordinary life and examines how he contrived to smuggle a multitude of treasures from his dig in Asia Minor to his government in Berlin.
  Updated 5.21.07
• The Medici Conspiracy: The Illicit Journey of Looted Antiquities--From Italy's Tomb Raiders to the World's Greatest Museums
  Author: Watson, Peter
  Publisher: Basic$ 26.95 ISBN: 1586484028 Date: 2006
  Booklist
  This gripping, true-life detective drama exposes an underground smuggling network with control of millions of dollars' worth of looted Italian antiquities, and how those stolen treasures have found their way into the world's most prestigious museums, auction houses, and private collections.
  Updated 5.21.07

 

 

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