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I will leave this on the book exchange shelf.
Released as part of the You're Such an Animal challenge.

This is an audio version of a book I read in 2010. Shortly after reading it, I began painting. I'm not so sure the audio version would have moved me as much as the print version did, but when a book makes you do something different in your life, it's probably a sign that it's a good book.

My review from 2010:

It's not all that often that a book makes you want to do something you've never done before. This book made me want to paint, to touch a canvas with oils and brush, and create art. I've done different sorts of artistic endeavors in my life, but never really that. To place the brush strokes, smell the oils, even have flecks of paint under my fingernails. To translate the angle of the sun into a glow on a canvas -- to tell a story and open a pathway to your soul...

Robert Oliver, an American painter of some renown, is arrested at the National Gallery of Art after attacking a painting there. He mutters, "I did it for her", and then essentially stops speaking. Andrew Marlow, his psychiatrist, delves into Oliver's life for clues to help unravel what actually happened and help his patient. Oliver's story is one of obsession, and ultimately, Marlow, too, becomes obsessed, but with untangling Oliver's story. He speaks with the women in Oliver's life. The story is interspersed with the story of a talented 19th-century Impressionist painter.

I know a lot of people balked at this book, or felt it too slow moving, or the characters to smug and self-righteous, but for an audio-read, it was great. I loved the details of both painting and of the world of French artists who depicted the world through light and color in the style that we now know as Impressionism. The story itself was secondary, for me (and occasionally I wanted to slap Béatrice silly for focusing so much on the Olivier's age).

Once, when we were on a trip in Europe, we visited Dieppe. There, I could see in front of me the very light and landscapes so familiar from my beloved Impressionists' paintings. At the town art museum, I was so excited, because I'd be able to see the paintings, and then out the window, the "real thing." But the first rooms of the museum were filled with other art, battles, crucifixions, martyrdoms, horrible deaths. I was overwhelmed, and forgetting the original purpose of coming to the museum, just wanted to escape the gore, but had to go forward to get out. Just when I thought I'd literally be ill if I had to look at one more death scene, we entered the room where the Impressionists were. I actually heaved a sigh of relief, and greeted my old friends joyfully. (My mother used to take me to the gallery regularly when I was a child. She, too, loved the Impressionists.) Stumbling upon them in this work reminded me of that experience -- encountering old friends unexpectedly.

Released as part of the 2014 You're Such an Animal Release Challenge.

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