It’s been twenty years since I celebrated the publication of my first novel. Been There, Done That tells the story of a thirty-something journalist who goes undercover at a small liberal arts college to expose an underground prostitution ring. With the current proliferation of websites with names like Sugar Daddy Meet, my book’s conceit seems almost quaint in hindsight, but that’s a discussion for another day.
Ten years and eight books later, I really did go back to college, though not under the guise of being nineteen. (Time comes for us all.) Twice a week, hauling a plastic bin crammed with oil paints, solvents, brushes, and rags, I’d scurry up the stairs of the art building at my local community college, where I was enrolled in Beginning Painting. My motto: “Fail Big, Fail Often.” It felt freeing to express myself creatively with nothing to lose.
For the next two years, I studied drawing and painting. When Covid hit, I continued to make art at home. When I finally felt ready to launch myself into a new book, I did so with a new perspective on creativity—and a desire to incorporate my newfound art knowledge.
You don’t have to be a painter, photographer, or sculptor to appreciate stories that center around art. Just look at the blockbuster success of The Da Vinci Code, Girl with a Pearl Earring, and The Silent Patient. Here are some other suspenseful reads about art and artists worth checking out.
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Mary Dixie Carter, The Photographer
Delta Dawn is a professional photographer for wealthy New Yorkers—the perfect career for a woman more comfortable observing (and manipulating) others from the fringes of life than in forging deep and honest relationships. Delta’s true gift, and obsession, lies not in capturing authentic moments but in using Photoshop to transform reality into fantasy. When Delta is hired to photograph eleven-year-old Natalie Straub’s birthday party, she finds herself wishing she was part of the scene rather than behind the lens.
Carter uses a photographer’s unique way of seeing the world to craft a wondrously creepy tale. Another Carter title worth checking out: Marguerite by the Lake, which centers around a famous painting.
Antoine Wilson, Mouth to Mouth
Come for the behind-the-scenes look at the world of elite Los Angeles art galleries; stay for Wilson’s gorgeous, taut prose and propulsive plotting. Jeff Cook rescues a man from drowning near the Santa Monica pier only to have his heroics go unrecognized. Young, aimless and searching for a focus, Jeff goes from savior to stalker, ultimately discovering that the man he dragged out of the surf is legendary art dealer Francis Arsenault. Jeff worms his way into an entry level job at Arsenault’s gallery only to have fate propel him into the man’s inner sanctum.
Wilson uses a chance encounter, twenty years after the near-drowning, to frame the narrative.
Katie Lattari, Dark Things I Adore
If you’ve ever fantasized about spending the summer at a picture-perfect art retreat, complete with towering pines, a glistening lake, and, best of all, not just “a room of your own” but your own log cabin, this one’s for you…assuming your fantasy also includes simmering class tensions, mental illness, and a young woman who may or may not have been murdered.
At the book’s center, Max Durant, a professor and renowned painter whose best work is behind him, acts as mentor—and aspiring lover—to Audra Colfax, an MFA student as inscrutable as she is gifted. When Audra takes Max to her house in the wilds of Maine, prey becomes predator as Audra’s motivations, revealed in a split timeline, become clear. Lattari uses Audra’s MFA thesis as a narrative device while exploring themes of control, authenticity, and exploitation among artists.
B. A. Shapiro, The Art Forger
Shapiro reliably lands on recommendation lists for thrillers about the art world, and with good reason. It’s been years since I read The Art Forger, but the intensity of the painting scenes stayed with me. Forget Man versus Man/Nature/Himself. This book is Woman versus Canvas, and the tension is intense.
Claire Roth is a struggling painter with a gift for reproducing impressionist art. When a powerful gallery owner asks her to copy a stolen Degas in exchange for a one-woman show, she must choose between ethics and ambition. It’s not much of a spoiler to say she chooses ambition; otherwise, there would be no plot. Centered around the still-unsolved 1990 Isabella Gardner Museum heist, this page-turner asks the reader to consider the nature of beauty, art, and creation.
Other books by Shapiro that center on the artworld include The Muralist and The Collector’s Apprentice.
Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch
A few years ago, I was at an art museum in the Netherlands when a small, exquisite painting of a bird caught my eye. It took a few moments to realize that Donna Tartt’s cover designs are so good, people pay to see them! Okay, I’m not actually that stupid (okay, sometimes I am), but seeing the titular painting, by Carel Fabritius, reminded me of how much I enjoyed this hugely successful novel, about a boy who survives a museum bombing only to spend the rest of his life hauling around a stolen painting while running away from grief.
While not technically a thriller, The Goldfinch is rife with suspense. Don’t be intimidated by the length of this work, which runs 900+ pages in hardcover. If anything, you’ll wish it was longer. If you want to see The Goldfinch in person (the painting, not the book), visit the Mauritius Museum, in the Hague. It is easily accessible by public transportation and boasts another famous “book cover” in its collection: Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring.
Carol Snow, The Girl on the Beach
In my first psychological thriller, coming in June 2026, Graham and Sonia Starr are the ideal Santa Barbara couple: he, an oil painter with a zest for life; she, a serial entrepreneur. But their perfect world falls apart when their inexplicably unsupervised four-year-old daughter disappears into the Pacific Ocean on a perfect August afternoon. Months later, Roxie’s babysitter, Colleen, returns to the Starrs’ beach house—only to see a child who bears a striking resemblance to Roxie running on the sand. Soon, Colleen’s quest for healing becomes a hunt for the truth.
I made Roxie’s father, Graham, an artist so I could write about painting. But art, whether through creation or appreciation, gives us a deeper understanding of what it means to be human. As a character too fond of vintage cars, luxury homes, and expensive shoes, Graham risked being two-dimensional. It was his painting that lent him complexity and allowed me to excavate his deep-seated appreciation for beauty along with buried disappointments and vulnerabilities.
If you enjoy reading books about art and artists, you might want to pick up a paintbrush – or a camera or a lump of clay. Don’t worry about impressing anyone. After all, if the novels on this list are any indication, the highest echelons of the artworld are rife with peril.
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