download portrait of a thief by grace d li

Moreover, Li’s characters are so educated, career driven, and emotionally aware that it’s hard to believe they would agree to jeopardize their futures by doing the heist in the first place. The problem is that these sections gum up the pace of the thriller. The characters’ meditations on the loss and hybridity of their identity-never feeling fully at home in China or America-are spot-on. For each, the payout represents a release from the pressures they associate with Chinese diaspora identity: achieving financial success and making a name for themselves. If Will and his crew can recover all five pieces, they’ll split a $50 million payout. The novel’s title, therefore, refers to not only the idealistic heisters, but also the art museums that knowingly purchased China’s stolen artifacts. These real-life fountainheads were looted from Beijing’s Old Summer Palace by the French and British in 1860 during the Second Opium War. Will and four other Chinese American college students-Will’s sister and several acquaintances-have been contracted by China’s youngest billionaire, the CEO of a shadowy company called China Poly, to steal five bronze fountainheads from museums around the world and return them to China. The problem: He’s actually running the heist. He quickly finds himself caught up in the investigation. While working at Harvard’s Sackler Museum, Will Chen, a senior majoring in art history, witnesses a robbery of Chinese art. A debut novel calls out institutionalized imperialism in the Western world.

Download portrait of a thief by grace d li