Book Review: The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova

Jul 12, 2010
Andree Lachapelle

The Swan Thieves - Photo courtesy Hachette Book Group

The Swan Thieves, a poetic second book by the best-selling author of the popular vampire novel The Historian, is sure to please Kostova's devoted fans.

Elizabeth Kostova’s latest book, The Swan Thieves, is yet another beautifully written saga from the mind that took an unconventional and poetic approach to age-old vampire tales in The Historian.

The Swan Thieves tells the story of Robert Oliver, a renowned, troubled painter who comes into the care of psychiatrist Andrew Marlow – himself an artist – after a violent outburst at a local museum. Oliver, motivated by secret compulsions he is unwilling to share with his doctor, violently attacked a painting that hung on the gallery’s walls: a portrait of the infamous Leda of legends, who falls prey to the god Zeus when he comes to her in the form of a swan. This classic work of art, it seems, had been haunting Robert Oliver for some time, and contributed to his downfall.

When the painter becomes a patient at the Goldengrove institute, Doctor Marlow does everything in his power to draw the sombre artist out of his shell. Sketchpads, pens, paints and an easel are supplied for Oliver to feel at home and eventually open up to the man who has his welfare and well-being in mind. This is a large, frustrating task and Doctor Marlow makes very little progress until the painter shares with him a stack of old letters from another century, letters that seem to hold the key to the mystery of Oliver’s erratic behaviour.

In The Swan Thieves, the author herself paints a lovely picture the details of which readers are only allowed to see slowly, piece by piece, one precise, painterly bit of prose at a time. Kostova’s novel abounds with elaborate descriptions that set the mood and bring the reader on Doctor Marlow’s journey through time and space, and into the mind of his subject. Those who enjoy fast-paced thrillers will be disappointed, but readers who take as much pleasure in painterly details as they do in the bulk of a story will be delighted by Elizabeth Kostova’s latest effort.

Author Elizabeth Kostova

Born in 1964 in New London, Connecticut, Elizabeth Kostova graduated from Yale University and completed a Master of Fine Arts at the University of Michigan while working on her first novel, The Historian, which focuses on the legendary Count Dracula. The Swan Thieves is her second novel. To find out more about the author and her work, visit Elizabeth Kostova’s official website.