SWAN THIEVES, THE - Little Brown

HISTORIANA HAUNTING NOVEL OF ART AND OBSESSION A MYSTERY SPANNING CONTINENTS AND CENTURIESA LOVE STORY THAT CROSES RHE ULTIMATE BORDER.ROBERT OLIVER, A RENOWNED PAINTER, has brutally attacked a canvas in the National Gallery of Art. From the confines of his hospital room, Oliver maintains a stubborn silence, offering only the briefest explanation before he stops speaking altogether:'I did it for her'But who is she? Andrew Marlow, a pyschiatrist, prides himself on his ability to make even a stone talk, but he gets nowhere with Oliver. Driven at first by professional curiosity, and then by a deterination that disrupts his ordened, careful world, Marlow embarks on an uncoventional pursuit of the answers his patient won''t provide, and on a journey into the lives of the women Oliver left behind.Richly told, beautifully imagined, THE SWAN THIEVES takes us across centuries, from American cities to the coast of Normandy, from young love to last love. Elizabeth Kostova deftly explores the painter's universe-passion, creativity, secrets, madness-and, with the gift for storytelling that made THE HISTORIAN an international senstion, conjures a world that lingers after the final page has turned.