Download or read book The Perfect Crime Unmasking the Isabella Stewart Gardner Heist written by Larry Maness and published by Speaking Volumes. This book was released on with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Before 11 priceless pieces of art were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, a respected Italian violin maker visited the museum to inspect a rare musical instrument requiring restoration. He took measurements and photographs and reported his findings to the museum’s director. Then, he disappeared. Was the innocent invitation to the violin maker the first step in a complex plot to rob the Gardner? The museum director thinks so and hires Theo R. Perdoux, an expert in worldwide art thefts, to investigate. Inspired by the actual unsolved robbery of Boston’s Gardner Museum, Maness spins a plausible web that races ahead like a shot. The brisk pace and clever twists offer an intriguing explanation why masterpieces worth millions have never been found.
Download or read book Unmasking written by Lavinia Dasani and published by L.D PLUMITIF. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "You are a talented writer. Unmasking was a great read." - Juliano Agertt (Jusky), Singer & Songwriter Phoebe thought she was an expert in leading a double life. But the moment she accepted Federick’s friendship, her vault of secrets began to crack. Wary by nature in a world of secrecy, pain, danger, and business moguls, Phoebe Smith, a loving mother, and covert spy, goes against her better judgment and befriend her ‘boss’, Federick Archer. Then to her horror, he gets a little too close for comfort. Once in control, Phoebe begins to lose her grip...and suddenly, the heat is on. Because as they grow closer, she begins to see him as more than just the devil who terrorised her in their childhood. And for the first time, her secret life is in danger of being exposed. Will she be able to keep her secrets hidden? Or will he seduce them out of her? A Spy Novel perfectly blended with romance, action, and drama.
Download or read book The Palgrave Handbook on Art Crime written by Saskia Hufnagel and published by Springer. This book was released on 2019-06-27 with total page 909 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This handbook showcases studies on art theft, fraud and forgeries, cultural heritage offences and related legal and ethical challenges. It has been authored by prominent scholars, practitioners and journalists in the field and includes both overviews of particular art crime issues as well as regional and national case studies. It is one of the first scholarly books in the current art crime literature that can be utilised as an immediate authoritative reference source or teaching tool. It also includes a bibliographic guide to the current literature across interdisciplinary boundaries. Apart from legal, criminological, archeological and historical perspectives on theft, fraud and looting, this volume contains chapters on iconoclasm and graffiti, underwater cultural heritage, the trade in human remains and the trade, theft and forgery of papyri. The book thereby hopes to encourage scholars from a wider variety of disciplines to contribute their valuable knowledge to art crime research.
Download or read book Illuminated Life written by Heidi Ardizzone and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2007-07-17 with total page 636 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ardizzone explores the secret life of Belle Da Costa Greene, the sensational woman behind the Morgan masterpieces, who was renowned for her self-made expertise, her acerbic wit, and her flirtatious relationships.
Download or read book Home to Italy written by Peter Pezzelli and published by Kensington Publishing Corp.. This book was released on 2012-10-01 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this delightful, moving novel, Peter Pezzelli brings to life the earthy sensuality of Italy's Abruzzo region— the smell of just-baked bread wafting through the village piazza; the shopkeepers sweeping the sidewalks first thing in the morning; groups of cyclists dotting the mountain roads—and spins a story of May-December romance as sharp and delicious as the olives of Villa San Giuseppe. . . SOMETIMES YOU HAVE TO TRAVEL FAR TO FIND YOUR WAY HOME. After the death of his beloved wife, Anna, Peppi's family and friends expect him to bury his grief by tending to his gardens and taking long rides on his bike. Instead, Peppi shocks them all with his decision to leave Rhode Island and return to Villa San Giuseppe, the small Italian village where he spent his childhood, and to il mulino, his family's old mill. But once he's back, he temporarily moves into an apartment over the candy factory run by his childhood best friend, Luca. It is modest, but livable, with a lovely view of Luca's neglected gardens and his equally neglected daughter, the fiery Lucrezia. More a force of nature than a woman, Lucrezia's legendary temper and workaholic schedule hide the very real pain she feels over her husband's death years before. At first, she tolerates Peppi as an eccentric annoyance—her father's strange but handsome American friend who fixes things around the factory and is bringing the gardens back to life. But soon, Lucrezia's interest in Peppi deepens. Like a high wind, the gossip is flying through Villa San Giuseppe—Lucrezia's making it to dinner on time. She's eating olives from a man's hand. She's wearing heels. Now, under the Italian sun, a tentative romance begins to bloom between the grieving pair, yielding to a surprisingly strong passion with the power to heal life's wounds and promise second chances. . .
Download or read book Female Masculinity written by Judith Halberstam and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Masculinity without men. In Female Masculinity Judith Halberstam takes aim at the protected status of male masculinity and shows that female masculinity has offered a distinct alternative to it for well over two hundred years. Providing the first full-length study on this subject, Halberstam catalogs the diversity of gender expressions among masculine women from nineteenth-century pre-lesbian practices to contemporary drag king performances. Through detailed textual readings as well as empirical research, Halberstam uncovers a hidden history of female masculinities while arguing for a more nuanced understanding of gender categories that would incorporate rather than pathologize them. She rereads Anne Lister's diaries and Radclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness as foundational assertions of female masculine identity. She considers the enigma of the stone butch and the politics surrounding butch/femme roles within lesbian communities. She also explores issues of transsexuality among "transgender dykes"--lesbians who pass as men--and female-to-male transsexuals who may find the label of "lesbian" a temporary refuge. Halberstam also tackles such topics as women and boxing, butches in Hollywood and independent cinema, and the phenomenon of male impersonators. Female Masculinity signals a new understanding of masculine behaviors and identities, and a new direction in interdisciplinary queer scholarship. Illustrated with nearly forty photographs, including portraits, film stills, and drag king performance shots, this book provides an extensive record of the wide range of female masculinities. And as Halberstam clearly demonstrates, female masculinity is not some bad imitation of virility, but a lively and dramatic staging of hybrid and minority genders.
Download or read book Stealing Rembrandts written by Anthony M. Amore and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2011-07-05 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Anthony M. Amore and Tom Mashberg's Stealing Rembrandts is a spellbinding journey into the high-stakes world of art theft Today, art theft is one of the most profitable criminal enterprises in the world, exceeding $6 billion in losses to galleries and art collectors annually. And the masterpieces of Rembrandt van Rijn are some of the most frequently targeted. In Stealing Rembrandts, art security expert Anthony M. Amore and award-winning investigative reporter Tom Mashberg reveal the actors behind the major Rembrandt heists in the last century. Through thefts around the world - from Stockholm to Boston, Worcester to Ohio - the authors track daring entries and escapes from the world's most renowned museums. There are robbers who coolly walk off with multimillion dollar paintings; self-styled art experts who fall in love with the Dutch master and desire to own his art at all costs; and international criminal masterminds who don't hesitate to resort to violence. They also show how museums are thwarted in their ability to pursue the thieves - even going so far as to conduct investigations on their own, far away from the maddening crowd of police intervention, sparing no expense to save the priceless masterpieces. Stealing Rembrandts is an exhilarating, one-of-a-kind look at the black market of art theft, and how it compromises some of the greatest treasures the world has ever known.
Download or read book Priceless written by Robert K. Wittman and published by Crown. This book was released on 2011-06-07 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Wall Street Journal called him “a living legend.” The London Times dubbed him “the most famous art detective in the world.” In Priceless, Robert K. Wittman, the founder of the FBI’s Art Crime Team, pulls back the curtain on his remarkable career for the first time, offering a real-life international thriller to rival The Thomas Crown Affair. Rising from humble roots as the son of an antique dealer, Wittman built a twenty-year career that was nothing short of extraordinary. He went undercover, usually unarmed, to catch art thieves, scammers, and black market traders in Paris and Philadelphia, Rio and Santa Fe, Miami and Madrid. In this page-turning memoir, Wittman fascinates with the stories behind his recoveries of priceless art and antiquities: The golden armor of an ancient Peruvian warrior king. The Rodin sculpture that inspired the Impressionist movement. The headdress Geronimo wore at his final Pow-Wow. The rare Civil War battle flag carried into battle by one of the nation’s first African-American regiments. The breadth of Wittman’s exploits is unmatched: He traveled the world to rescue paintings by Rockwell and Rembrandt, Pissarro, Monet and Picasso, often working undercover overseas at the whim of foreign governments. Closer to home, he recovered an original copy of the Bill of Rights and cracked the scam that rocked the PBS series Antiques Roadshow. By the FBI’s accounting, Wittman saved hundreds of millions of dollars worth of art and antiquities. He says the statistic isn’t important. After all, who’s to say what is worth more --a Rembrandt self-portrait or an American flag carried into battle? They're both priceless. The art thieves and scammers Wittman caught run the gamut from rich to poor, smart to foolish, organized criminals to desperate loners. The smuggler who brought him a looted 6th-century treasure turned out to be a high-ranking diplomat. The appraiser who stole countless heirlooms from war heroes’ descendants was a slick, aristocratic con man. The museum janitor who made off with locks of George Washington's hair just wanted to make a few extra bucks, figuring no one would miss what he’d filched. In his final case, Wittman called on every bit of knowledge and experience in his arsenal to take on his greatest challenge: working undercover to track the vicious criminals behind what might be the most audacious art theft of all.
Download or read book The Art Forger written by B. A. Shapiro and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2013-05-21 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Don't miss B. A. Shapiro's new novel, Metropolis, available now! “[A] highly entertaining literary thriller about fine art and foolish choices.” —Parade “[A] nimble mystery.” —The New York Times Book Review “Gripping.” —O, The Oprah Magazine Almost twenty-five years after the infamous art heist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum—still the largest unsolved art theft in history—one of the stolen Degas paintings is delivered to the Boston studio of a young artist. Claire Roth has entered into a Faustian bargain with a powerful gallery owner by agreeing to forge the Degas in exchange for a one-woman show in his renowned gallery. But as she begins her work, she starts to suspect that this long-missing masterpiece—the very one that had been hanging at the Gardner for one hundred years—may itself be a forgery. The Art Forger is a thrilling novel about seeing—and not seeing—the secrets that lie beneath the canvas.
Download or read book Crime Films written by Thomas Leitch and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2002-08-15 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book surveys the entire range of crime films, including important subgenres such as the gangster film, the private eye film, film noir, as well as the victim film, the erotic thriller, and the crime comedy. Focusing on ten films that span the range of the twentieth century, Thomas Leitch traces the transformation of the three leading figures that are common to all crime films: the criminal, the victim and the avenger. Analyzing how each of the subgenres establishes oppositions among its ritual antagonists, he shows how the distinctions among them become blurred throughout the course of the century. This blurring, Leitch maintains, reflects and fosters a deep social ambivalence towards crime and criminals, while the criminal, victim and avenger characters effectively map the shifting relations between subgenres, such as the erotic thriller and the police film, within the larger genre of crime film that informs them all.
Download or read book The Death Artist written by Jonathan Santlofer and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-03-17 with total page 452 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The debut novel from the author of The Lost Van Gogh—first in the Kate McKinnon series. “A unique spin on the too-familiar serial killer thriller.” —Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel A killer is preying on New York’s art community, creating gruesome depictions of famous paintings, using human flesh and blood as his media. Terror stalks this world of genius, greed, inspiration, and jealousy—a world Kate McKinnon knows all too well. A former NYPD cop who traded in her badge for a PhD in art history, Kate can see the method behind the psychopath’s madness—for the grisly slaughter of a former protégé is drawing her into the predator’s path. And as each new murder exceeds the last in savagery, Kate is trapped in the twisted obsessions of the death artist, who plans to use her body, her blood, and her fear to create the ultimate masterpiece. “The Death Artist is stylish, scary, and very, very smart. Jonathan Santlofer’s thriller really thrills.” —Susan Isaacs, New York Times–bestselling author “Chilling.” —USA Today “A roller coaster of violence [and] betrayal.” —Cleveland Plain Dealer “Brisk . . . inventive . . . compelling.” —The Washington Post Book World “The exploration of the psychology of the death artist, along with gossipy insights into the politics of art, make this book a bloody funfest.” —Publishers Weekly
Download or read book Forensic Medicine of the Lower Extremity written by Jeremy Rich and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2005-02-24 with total page 425 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Annotation This book covers human identification, trauma analysis, and forensic biomechanics of the foot, ankle, tibia, and femur as frequently encountered in mass casualty incidents, human decomposition, and human rights abuse investigations.
Download or read book American Cocktail written by Anita Reynolds and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2014-02-24 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the rollicking, never-before-published memoir of a fascinating African American woman with an uncanny knack for being in the right place in the most interesting times. Actress, dancer, model, literary critic, psychologist, and free-spirited provocateur, Anita Reynolds was, as her Parisian friends nicknamed her, an American Cocktail.
Download or read book When Old Technologies Were New written by Carolyn Marvin and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1990-05-24 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the history of electronic communication, the last quarter of the nineteenth century holds a special place, for it was during this period that the telephone, phonograph, electric light, wireless, and cinema were all invented. In When old Technologies Were New, Carolyn Marvin explores how two of these new inventions--the telephone and the electric light--were publicly envisioned at the end of the nineteenth century, as seen in specialized engineering journals and popular media. Marvin pays particular attention to the telephone, describing how it disrupted established social relations, unsettling customary ways of dividing the private person and family from the more public setting of the community. On the lighter side, she describes how people spoke louder when calling long distance, and how they worried about catching contagious diseases over the phone. A particularly powerful chapter deals with telephonic precursors of radio broadcasting--the "Telephone Herald" in New York and the "Telefon Hirmondo" of Hungary--and the conflict between the technological development of broadcasting and the attempt to impose a homogenous, ethnocentric variant of Anglo-Saxon culture on the public. While focusing on the way professionals in the electronics field tried to control the new media, Marvin also illuminates the broader social impact, presenting a wide-ranging, informative, and entertaining account of the early years of electronic media.
Download or read book Anatomy of Fear written by Jonathan Santlofer and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NYPD sketch artist Nate Rodriguez possesses a remarkable gift. From the smallest clues—an off-hand comment, a brief flash of fear in a victim's eyes—he is able to create an uncanny likeness of the assailant. Now Detective Terri Russo needs his help to solve a particularly shocking series of murders, perpetrated by a psychopath who enjoys drawing pictures of his crimes before committing them. Nate is being asked to enter the dark, twisted mind of a monster—to re-create a face that no one has lived to identify. But as a portrait slowly begins taking shape in Nate's mind and on the page, an electrifying game of cat and mouse reaches an unexpected new level—as a brilliant killer uses his own unique talents to turn the investigation in a terrifying new direction... A breathtakingly original novel of suspense, Jonathan Santlofer's Anatomy of Fear mixes prose and pictures to create a story that burns its way into the brain and brilliantly revitalizes the crime fiction genre.
Download or read book The Voice of God written by Larry Maness and published by . This book was released on 2013-10 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An ailing mother, the death of his son, and a divorce all converge on Lino Cardosa, forcing him to leave his insurance investigator life and return home to Provincetown. Not long after his return, a fire burns Provincetown's St. Peter the Apostle Church to the ground, church funds are stolen, and the priest, Father Jeremiah Dunn, disappears. When Lino is told that Father Dunn has answers to Lino's son's suicide, he sets out to find the priest and the truth.
Download or read book The Art of the Con written by Anthony M. Amore and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2015-07-14 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Art scams are today so numerous that the specter of a lawsuit arising from a mistaken attribution has scared a number of experts away from the business of authentication and forgery, and with good reason. Art scams are increasingly convincing and involve incredible sums of money. The cons perpetrated by unscrupulous art dealers and their accomplices are proportionately elaborate. Anthony M. Amore's The Art of the Con tells the stories of some of history's most notorious yet untold cons. They involve stolen art hidden for decades; elaborate ruses that involve the Nazis and allegedly plundered art; the theft of a conceptual prototype from a well-known artist by his assistant to be used later to create copies; the use of online and television auction sites to scam buyers out of millions; and other confidence scams incredible not only for their boldness but more so because they actually worked. Using interviews and newly released court documents, The Art of the Con will also take the reader into the investigations that led to the capture of the con men, who oftentimes return back to the world of crime. For some, it's an irresistible urge because their innocent dupes all share something in common: they want to believe.
