Description
Kosoko Jackson's adult fantasy debut is a stand-alone novel blending art history, time- and globe-hopping adventure, and dark horror and fantasy about ten cursed paintings and the lengths people will go to collect them, destroy them… or be destroyed.
A struggling painter, Lewis Dixon is shocked when the British Museum shows an unusual interest in his art. While he’s always felt there’s something powerful about what he puts on canvas, he also sensed something disturbing just under the surface—especially after he was compelled to make a painting of a painting, one he has a connection to: the object of his art turns out to be one of the ten paintings his great-grandfather created over a hundred years ago. Only Lewis’s version is surreal…and maybe just a touch horrific.
Still, he accepts the invitation, only to find not a curated show but a test to see if he not only has the magic necessary to enter the paintings, but also the strength to escape them. Because unbeknownst to Lewis, there is power in his art, just as the ten paintings carry with them both immense eldritch abilities and a terrible curse—making them, perhaps, the most valuable works of art in the world.
And Lewis has been asked to destroy them all.
With orders from a mysterious museum official, Evangeline, and partnered with an alluring agent in her employ, Noah Rao, Lewis must plunge into a world of black markets, gothic magic, ancient history, and unspeakable terror to save those unlucky enough to call any of the paintings their own, and to hopefully locate the tenth painting in the series, long missing, the powers of which are suspected to be the most devastating of all…
A picture is worth a thousand nightmares.
Endorsements
Kosoko Jackson — USA Today bestselling author.