Chasing Vermeer is a 2004 children's art mystery novel written by Blue Balliett and illustrated by Brett Helquist. Set in Hyde Park, Chicago near the University of Chicago, the novel follows two children, Calder Pillay and Petra Andalee. After a famous Johannes Vermeer painting, A Lady Writing, is stolen en route to the Art Institute of Chicago, Calder and Petra work together to try to recover it. The thief publishes many advertisements in the newspaper, explaining that he will give the painting back if the community can discover which paintings under Vermeer's name were really painted by him. This causes Petra, Calder, and the rest of Hyde Park to examine art more closely. Themes of art, chance, coincidence, deception, and problem-solving are apparent. The novel was written for Balliett's classroom intended to deal with real-world issues. Balliett values children's ideas and wrote the book specifically to highlight that. Chasing Vermeer has won several awards, including the Edgar and the Agatha. In 2006, the sequel entitled The Wright 3 was published, followed by The Calder Game in 2008. Inspiration and origin Chasing Vermeer is Blue Balliett's first published book. Its original purpose was a book to read to her class for fun. She realized that a mystery about "real" art issues had not been written since E.L. Konigsburg's 1967 novel From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and desired to write what she wished to read. Chasing Vermeer took about five years to complete, as Balliett was also a teacher and parent. She compared writing the book to weaving, as she first wrote mainly about art, but then incorporated the pentominoes and classroom scenes, creating many different levels to read on. She admits that it ended up more complex than she had thought it would be. Balliett used art and blank plates as inspiration for the characters' names. Calder Pillay is derived from the artist Alexander Calder and Petra Andalee was inspired by the architecture in Petra, Jordan. The names were meant to be different, which Balliett considered "fun for a child." Balliett felt that she could capture the attention of reluctant readers if they related to characters who enjoyed writing and math. Calder and Petra's teacher, Ms. Hussey, was inspired by an old name on Nantucket Island and the old-fashioned word hussy. Balliett compares herself to Ms. Hussey, stating that "[we] think a lot alike." Some of Ms.