The Van Gogh Deception, written by Deron Hicks, reviewed by Klaudia Janek

This book was a delight to read! The first chapter started in France and then it quickly fast forwarded to Washington DC in the present day. The main character is Art, who is suffering from amnesia and cannot remember anything about himself. When he appeared in the National Gallery of Art, he sat there staring at a Degas sculpture until the police came to try to help him. An ER doctor told Art that his amnesia was probably from a traumatic event. Then we are introduced to Mary Sullivan who agreed to take Art into foster care. Her daughter, Camille, offered this story a lot of humor and spunk. She was a great partner for Art to try to solve the mystery with. As the mystery begins to unravel, Art must know something because he has scary adults chasing him and people in big, black SUV’s trying to grab him. Camille stands by him because she thinks Art needs her. There are some tense moments as they have to fight for their escape. They also quickly realize that they cannot trust anyone and they are somehow being tracked. Readers will not be able to put the book down until they figure out who Art is and what he knows.

So, I typically do not buy middle grade books for my high school library, but I follow the discussions and read a lot of them just for fun. I had not heard of this book, but I immediately loved the cover and decided to read it. Every middle and upper elementary school library should have this book! It is such a great introduction to the art world. I thought it was really unique to have the QR codes throughout the story so that a reader could look up the painting that was being written about. A lot of the QR codes take you to the National Gallery of Art. This is the perfect edtech literacy integration for any librarian. I read this book in one day because it was so good. I like the style of writing, the characters, the setting and the mystery. The publisher did a beautiful job with the inside covers as they contain the most famous VanGogh paintings...in color...

Straight Talk for School Librarians: This book could be tied into Visual Arts classes, discussions about art forgery, the cost of works of art. It could even work for a history class as it addresses the fact that the Nazis stole a lot of paintings and a lot of them have not found their way into the hands of the rightful owners even to this day. If there is a field trip planned for the National Gallery of Art, this is a must read. For IB schools, there are a lot of interdisciplinary connections. There can also be a lot of connections to the IB Learner profile. For example, Art comes across as very knowledgeable and he is definitely a risk-taker. Camille comes across as caring and principled. Students can have a lot of discussions about the Learner Profile traits. It would be a good classroom or book club read. It’s a smart, edge-of-your-seat story that I enjoyed very much. Go out and get this book!


by Klaudia Janek @kjanek
Author Twitter @DeronHicks
Author website http://www.deronhicks.com/
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt @HMHKids