Skip to product information
1 of 1

Portrait of an Unknown Lady

- 208 Pages
Published: 03/03/2022

Regular price £12.42
Regular price £14.99 Sale price £12.42
Sale Sold out
Condition
Share this product with your friends.
  • Summary
  • Author
  • Product Details
  • Review

In this dazzling story of art and illusion, secrets and schemes, who is to be trusted - and what is real?

From the internationally acclaimed author of Optic Nerve, a New York Times Notable Book 2019


'A writer who feels immediately important' Observer

At a hotel in Buenos Aires, a woman checks in under a pseudonym. She wears a black fur shawl and has no luggage. She is alone.

Over the coming days and nights, she tells a story, which begins with a secret shared in a local bath house, revealing art forgery and fraud on a dazzling scale. At its heart is an enigmatic genius who for years forged portraits of the city's elite, before disappearing without trace. It is a story of influence and intrigue, in which nothing is as it seems. We're not to expect 'names, numbers or dates', she cautions, but a more subtle kind of reckoning...

Told in a mordant, irresistible voice and full of sharp surprises, Portrait of an Unknown Lady is a captivating enquiry into what we mean by 'authenticity', in life as in art. At once poised and capricious, elegant and bold, it is a thrilling exploration of the relationships between what is lived, what is told, what is remembered, and what is real.

Translated from the Spanish by Thomas Bunstead