The Creative Life: Captivating Novels About Art and Artists

An artist races to escape her traumatic past and envision a new life for herself in Charleen Hurtubise’s Saoirse. After fleeing Michigan for Ireland, Saoirse — once Sarah — has found freedom and contentment far from the terrible early years she endured. But when her artwork gains traction, Saoirse finds herself caught in a spotlight that threatens to expose the secrets of her former life and the new identity she adopted to survive. Propulsive and evocative, Saoirse is a “delicious literary jigsaw, leaving the reader to piece together the memories, paintings, and confessions of our eponymous heroine” (Liz Nugent, bestselling author of Strange Sally Diamond).

Alicia Berenson appears to lead a picture-perfect life. She’s a successful painter married to a fashion photographer, and they live together in a lavish London home. So everyone is shocked when, one night, Alicia shoots her husband five times in the face and then refuses to speak another word. Locked away in a forensic unit, Alicia is propelled into a new kind of notoriety as the value of her art skyrockets. Criminal psychotherapist Theo Faber becomes fixated on her case. He’s determined to hear Alicia talk and untangle what really happened that night — but is he prepared for what he might discover? Alex Michaelides’s bestselling The Silent Patient is an unforgettable psychological thriller that intertwines Greek mythology and artistic flair with gripping storytelling. 

From Margaret Atwood, the bestselling author of The Handmaid’s Tale, Cat’s Eye tells the story of a painter haunted by the memories of her childhood. When controversial artist Elaine Risley returns to the town she grew up in, the formative friendships, desires, and betrayals of her youth come rushing back. Elaine must grapple with the resurgence of her past and its impact on the present in this dark and wise novel. The New York Times Book Review calls Cat’s Eye “nightmarish, evocative, heartbreaking.” 

Donna Tart’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel, The Goldfinch, is a captivating story of obsession, grief, and the “underworld of art and wealth.” After his mother dies, 13-year-old Theo goes to live with a wealthy family on Park Avenue and cherishes the one thing he has left of his mom: “The Goldfinch,” a painting she loved. As an adult, Theo’s connection to the painting draws him deeper into the strange, dangerous world of antiquities and art dealing. Immersive and dazzling, The Goldfinch is a work of art itself.

Twenty-five years after a notorious, unsolved art heist shocks the world, a young artist named Claire Roth faces a moral dilemma. One of the stolen Degas paintings has arrived at her Boston studio — in exchange for forging the painting, she is offered a solo exhibition at a renowned gallery. Claire accepts the proposal. But as she gets to work, Claire begins to suspect that the priceless Degas she’s forging might not be the original either. Exciting and dexterous, The Art Forger by B. A. Shapiro is a “highly entertaining literary thriller about fine art and foolish choices” (Parade).

Rachel Kushner’s celebrated The Flamethrowers follows a young woman named Reno, who leaves behind the neon-lit casinos of Nevada for 1970s New York City. Upon arriving, she delves into the city’s booming art scene, drawing on the raw creative energy surging through SoHo and tracing the intersecting currents of life and art. Populated by a dizzying cast of artists, radicals, and grifters, Reno’s story is at once a cultural observation, a historical snapshot, and an exhilarating work of fiction. 

Inspired by Johannes Vermeer’s famed painting of the same name, Girl with a Pearl Earring tells the imagined history of the young girl immortalized on the canvas. Sixteen-year-old Griet works as a maid in the home of an artist, and her time there will change her life forever. A New York Times bestseller, Girl with a Pearl Earring is an evocative story of creative inspiration, forbidden desire, and the complex dynamic of an artist and their muse.

In this national bestseller, an artist seeks redemption amid the sweeping beauty of the American West. Jim Stegner is a famous yet troubled painter beset by darkness. After serving time for shooting someone in a Santa Fe bar, he relocates to Colorado and strives to live a peaceful life. But the dangerous impulses he’s suppressed resurface when he witnesses an act of animal cruelty. Now, with violence on his hands and a target on his back, he has no choice but to return to his former life and reckon with the battling shadows of his past. The New York Times Book Review calls Peter Heller’s The Painter “a moving story about love, celebrity, and the redemptive power of art.” 

Masterfully told and steeped in suspense, The Last Painting of Sara de Vos by Dominique Browning is a captivating work of literary fiction. In Amsterdam in 1631, Sara de Vos defies the expectations of women artists at the time, first by being admitted as a master painter to the city’s Guild of St. Luke and then by painting a haunting landscape, despite the custom that limited women’s art to indoor scenes. In 1957, Ellie Shipley, an art history grad student, agrees to forge de Vos’s “At the Edge of the Wood” for a shady art dealer — a decision that entangles her with the painting’s wealthy owner. Decades later, Ellie is now a celebrated art historian and curator who’s about to mount an exhibition. But the success she’s spent a lifetime achieving threatens to be toppled when it becomes clear that both the original painting and her forgery are headed to the museum.  

Irving Stone’s biographical novel about Michelangelo Buonarroti presents a brilliant portrait of the legendary artist, capturing the settings, people, and events that inspired his immeasurable artistry. In High Renaissance Italy, as the Catholic church and the Medici family vie for power, Michelangelo creates some of the greatest works of art the world has ever seen, from his sculpture of David and his painting of the Sistine Chapel ceiling to the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica. Sweeping in scale, The Agony and the Ecstasy is a monumental work of historical literature.