Naked reclining statue

Author: Daren Frank
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2000-03-01
Features: Most of the famous painters and poets appearing in this book are real people. The novel intertwines scenes of human nature, war, the circumstances of artists, Parisian high-class brothels, and more with the setup and development of plot suspense. It makes this book both a grand-scale saga of artists' lives and a suspense novel, bizarre and gripping, leaving readers unable to put it down. At the beginning of the 20th century, Russian painter Lev Koroivena came to Paris. After the outbreak of World War I, he was drafted into the army and assigned to an undercover unit founded by Cubist painters. On the battlefield, he and a comrade were both severely wounded. The comrade was crushed under him, constantly repeating the name of a strange woman for 11 hours before dying. Lev returned to Paris and found he could no longer paint—no matter what the subject was, his canvases were filled with the insignia of the undercover unit—a chameleon. War had destroyed his creative inspiration! He struggled desperately to save himself, but it was all in vain. Eventually, he realized that perhaps only that mysterious stranger could help him regain his artistic life, so he began to search for her. The painters and writers who gathered in the bohemian Montparnasse district of Paris also extended a helping hand to him. Many years passed, and as they followed the trail of their search, various characters entered Lev's life, and the terrifying and absurd truth gradually revealed itself to him.