SUMMARY
Thief of Light
Adrian Sellers is a fast-moving, greedy New York City art dealer who has found a shortcut to the top – selling forgeries to a wealthy Japanese businessman. When Adrian’s gifted forger doesn’t deliver his latest commission, a fake Monet water lilies, the scam begins to unravel. After a frantic search for the artist, Adrian makes a horrifying discovery – his brilliant forger has been viciously murdered in his SoHo loft and the newly finished painting is irreparably damaged. Unable to deliver the ‘Monet’ to his client, Ryuichi Tanaka, Adrian and his partner offer to return the man’s money. Tanaka has other ideas. Having already made plans for the placement of the forgery and unwilling to lose face by changing those arrangements, Tanaka demands that Adrian deliver and original Monet – a painting worth millions of dollars. Tanaka punctuates his demand with an unspeakable act that sends Adrian’s life spiraling into chaos.
Adrian takes to the Manhattan streets in a frantic race to save his life. On neon-splashed Broadway and then in the confines of a seedy midtown hotel room he comes face-to-face with yet another demon – his addiction to heroin. With his stash dwindling and the cold hand of the Japanese mob around every corner, Adrian turns in desperation to Devon Berenson, who agrees to shelter him in her apartment, where together they face the terrors of his drug withdrawal. Their lives become helplessly intwined as they comb the underworld of the Manhattan art scene for a way out, and Adrian begins his transformation a man who must fight insurmountable odds to Dave his own life and the life of the woman he loves.
From a multi-million-dollar brownstone on the upper East Side to a menacing midtown back alley to an auction of priceless objects on the floor of Christie’s, Thief of Light combines a complex and thrilling plot with a heart-pounding conclusion.