Art Crime

Master Forger David Henty has a problem: a forgery he painted is rejected and suddenly he owes a murderous, blind, female Japanese gangster £5 million.

August 21, 2013: A chemical weapons attack on the suburbs of Damascus reminds the world of the existence of the Syrian war. Hundreds of journalists from every corner of the world rush to the frontier only to leave disappointed when Obama decides not to bomb. They leave behind 200,000 estimated victims, and more than half of a population of 22 million people dispersed or refugeed in nearby countries: the worst humanitarian crisis since WWII according to the UN.

In the magical and historically rich city of Siena, Italy, old paintings are as common as cobblestones. But what if some of those paintings are forgeries? And what if your employers at Restauro Lorenzetti, a respected firm of art conservators, might be smuggling antiquities? After colleague and roommate Ernst Mann is found dead in the street below their apartment balcony, Flora Garibaldi suspects her bosses are crooks. The Italian police, after ruling Flora innocent of murder, persuade her to spy on her employers.

Not long ago, Somerville, Massachusetts was commonly referred to as “Slummerville.” A gritty, blue-collar town just north of Boston, its major claim to fame was a brutal gang war. Then, the Boston subway system’s Red Line came to Somerville’s Davis Square, and the town began to attract a more affluent, professional class to mix with its traditional working class base. The mixing has not always been easy.

All his life, journalist Walter Shapiro assumed that the outlandish stories about his great-uncle Freeman were exaggerated family lore; some cockamamie Jewish revenge fantasies dreamt up to entertain the kids and venerate their larger-than-life relative. Only when he started researching Freeman Bernstein's life did he realize that his family was actually holding back.

No es ficción, es pura realidad. Para lograr la primicia y llegar hasta donde las fuerzas militares no podían, una periodista colombiana se traza como objetivo: penetrar sola, hasta el corazón de las Farc. Tras conocer los secretos íntimos de la guerra, descubre que conocidos de su pasado estaban ligados a quienes hacían parte del conflicto.

When Adam Parfrey tracked down Walter Keane - the credited artist of the weepy waifs - for a San Diego Reader cover story in 1992, he discovered some shocking facts. Decades of lawsuits and countersuits revealed the reality that Keane was more of a conman than an artist and that he forced his wife, Margaret, to sign his name to her own paintings. As a result those weepy waifs may not have been as capricious an invention as they seemed.

It's not often that Detective Sue Penner gets a night out on the town. She’s thrilled to be the Captain’s plus one at a prestigious art gala, but her enjoyment is cut short when the event’s host fails to make an appearance. When his body is pulled from the Ottawa River later that night, it offers more questions than answers. Mark Williams was a personal friend of the Captain’s, and Detectives Penner and Millar are determined to find out how and why he died. But it won’t be easy. They’ll need to play nice with the local RCMP—easier said than done. After a run-in with an ...

If anything has become clear, it’s that our understanding of the Arab Islamic world remains shrouded and incomplete. The seeds of revolution, radicalism, and—possibly—reform are buried in the individual stories of millions of people whose lives determine the fates of their societies, people whose motivations are as common, and as strange, as our own. Here is one of those stories—and the story of how this world is being transformed, one life at a time.

Au cours de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, le système Double Cross (en anglais Double Cross System ou XX System, double cross signifiant tromper) était un dispositif de contre-espionnage organisé par le MI5, le service de renseignements britannique actif sur le territoire du Royaume-Uni, qui eut pour finalité la désinformation des services secrets allemands. Des agents nazis ont été capturés et retournés puis utilisés par les Britanniques principalement pour diffuser de fausses informations à leurs officiers-traitants allemands.

London. 1910. A procession of well-attired gentlemen and ladies are clearly out of place among the stalls and pushcarts of the Whitechapel District. As the group makes its way through the crowded streets, the tour guide stops now and then to point out various places where the mutilated bodies of the women had been found. Although the murders occurred twenty-two years prior, the man leading the group seems to know every detail and aspect of each slaying. Of those things he does not know, he offers freely his own insightful conjecture.

When reclusive millionaire artist Robert Indiana died in 2018, he left behind dark rumors and scandal, as well as an estate embroiled in lawsuits and facing accusations of fraud. Here is the true story of the artist’s final days, the aftermath, the deceptive world that surrounded him, and the inner workings of art as very big business.

When a nameless, struggling actor in 1970s New York gets the call that an enigmatic director wants him for an art film set in the Amazon, he doesn't hesitate: He flies to South America, no questions asked. He quickly realizes he's made a mistake. He's replacing another actor who quit after seeing the script - a script the director now claims doesn't exist. The movie is over budget. The production team seems headed for a breakdown. The air is so wet that the celluloid film disintegrates.

Crime and Punishment, and Notes from Underground are two of the most famous novels written by Fyodor Dostoevsky, a Russian author widely considered to be one of the greatest writers of all time. These three books, in particular, are often cited as among his greatest works.

During his decades-long crime coverage in Central Florida, journalist Frank Stanfield covered every atrocity that man or nature could unleash. Vampires, Gators, and Wackos: A Florida Newspaperman’s Life recounts some of the frequently craven, and at times downright stupid, crimes Stanfield covered during his time in the field. He somehow made it through without winding up more mental than the crackpots he tracked. However, his unvarnished, no-holds-barred account of news events reveals just how crazy-making a case can be when you are dead set on nailing the truth.

Sam Carr is determined to find and kill the five men who brutally attacked him and kidnapped his girlfriend while vacationing in Hawaii. As a consequence of his actions, he is offered full immunity for any and all past crimes if he assassinates a notorious radical Islamic terrorist who is believed to be in charge of a terror cell in London. Unfortunately, things go terribly wrong on this mission. In order to find and put an end to the mysterious person responsible for reprehensible acts of terrorism, Sam must join forces with a team of undercover Mossad agents. Yet, even though Sam has been...

8 years ago she ran to safety. Now Charlotte Montgomery’s past has caught up with her.Charlotte Montgomery was forced to leave everything behind to shield her son from a dangerous life. As an artist, she’s built a new world of safety and security for them both, far from the shadows that once haunted her. But the peace she’s fought so hard to maintain is shattered when her past comes crashing back. The Italian crime family she escaped from has reappeared, determined to pull her back into their web of deceit and crime. This time, they want her to participate in their money-laundering ...

Izzy Stone, a top Secret Service agent, is in charge of a presidential visit to Paris. Without warning, a powerful French magistrate charges the US President with war crimes and crimes against humanity after an American counterterrorist strike goes awry. Now Izzy finds herself in a bloody, desperate race to save POTUS from certain death. A lethal cat and mouse chase unfolds across the City of Lights as Izzy uses her knowledge of Paris' ancient catacombs, a buried chateau fort, and the great Louvre to elude their pursuers.

When 28-year-old San Francisco Daily Morning Call reporter Mark Twain met Tom Sawyer at a local bathhouse in 1863, he was seeking a subject for his first novel. As Twain steamed, played cards, and drank beer with Sawyer (a volunteer firefighter, customs inspector, and local hero responsible for having saved 90 lives at sea), he had second thoughts about Shirley Tempest, his proposed book about a local girl firefighter, and began to envision a novel of wider scope.

Carmen Aguirre has lived many lives, all of them to the fullest. At age six she was a Chilean refugee adjusting to life as a Latina in North America. At 18 she was a revolutionary dissident. In her early 20s she fought to find her voice as an actor and to break away from the stereotypical roles thrust upon her - Housekeeper, Hotel Maid, Mexican Hooker #1.