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Title: Very uneven
Review: This book has all the feeling of a book of essays cobbled together into a book so the essayist can get paid for the same work a second time. The thin thread of the painting fails to provide a way to sustain the reader's interest from episode to episode, and the device of working backward in time leaves the uncomfortable feeling of knowing in advance what will happen to this painting that some have loved and some just possessed. I would rate the book even lower but for the wonderful description of Vermeer's technique in the first chapter! The book's small redeeming grace is that it can be read so quickly that not a lot of time is wasted on it.
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