Dominic Smith, _The Last Painting of Sara de Vos_

I PROBABLY WOULD not have picked this up had our book club not voted it in as our June book, but it turned out to be enjoyable. A bit reminiscent of Colum McCann in having three distinct-but-related story lines in three different historical settings, braided together in rotating series over the whole book rather than in chronological sequence.

One story line is set in 17th century Holland and concerns Sara de Vos, married to a painter and a painter herself. They endure a series of bad breaks, the worst being the death of their only child, a daughter. A painting Sara makes to commemorate the lost child, At the Edge of the Wood, has become her only known surviving work at the time of Storyline Two...

...set in 1950s New York. At the Edge of the Wood was purchased by a merchant named de Groot and  has remained in that family for over 300 years. Current owner Marty de Groot is a successful lawyer in addition to having considerable inherited wealth, but suffers from anomie until he discovers his family heirloom has been stolen and replaced with a skillful forgery. He finds out the forgery is the work of Ellie Shipley, a young art history doctoral student whose dissertation is floundering. Under an assumed name, he first hires her, then courts her, plotting a terrible revenge.

Third storyline: Sydney, Australia, the year 2000, and Ellie Shipley, now an eminent art historian for her work on women artists of the Dutch Golden Age, is organizing a major exhibit, and finds out two copies of de Vos's most famous painting, the original and her youthful forgery, are on their way to Sydney. Marty de Groot is still alive and is bringing his painting (is it the original or the ]forgery?) himself. Questions will inevitably be asked. Will she be exposed and disgraced?

Smith obviously did a lot of research for Story Line One, but what with all the details about food and furniture and guild rules and tulips, it feels a little too worked-up. There is more attention to the background than to Sara, who remains two-dimensional.

The Marty-Ellie agon was compelling, though. Their relationship is born in a cloud of dishonesty, dissimulation, betrayal, and corruption, but nonetheless has something genuine in it, something they both badly need: the jolt that would get them out of their respective ruts.