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Steve Martin

An Object of Beauty: A Novel Hardcover – November 23, 2010

by Steve Martin (Author)

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Lacey Yeager is young, captivating, and ambitious enough to take the NYC art world by storm. Groomed at Sotheby's and hungry to keep climbing the social and career ladders put before her, Lacey charms men and women, old and young, rich and even richer with her magnetic charisma and liveliness. Her ascension to the highest tiers of the city parallel the soaring heights--and, at times, the dark lows--of the art world and the country from the late 1990s through today.

Print length

304 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Grand Central Publishing
Publication date

November 23, 2010
Dimensions

6.25 x 1 x 9.25 inches
ISBN-10

0446573647
ISBN-13

978-0446573641
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Martin compresses the wild and crazy end of the millennium and finds in this piercing novel a sardonic morality tale. Lacey Yeager is an ambitious young art dealer who uses everything at her disposal to advance in the world of the high-end art trade in New York City. After cutting her teeth at Sotheby's, she manipulates her way up through Barton Talley's gallery of "Very Expensive Paintings," sleeping with patrons, and dodging and indulging in questionable deals, possible felonies, and general skeeviness until she opens her own gallery in Chelsea. Narrated by Lacey's journalist friend, Daniel Franks, whose droll voice is a remarkable stand-in for Martin's own, the world is ordered and knowable, blindly barreling onward until 9/11. And while Lacey and the art she peddles survive, the wealth and prestige garnered by greed do not. Martin (an art collector himself) is an astute miniaturist as he exposes the sound and fury of the rarified Manhattan art world. If Shopgirl was about the absence of purpose, this book is about the absence of a moral compass, not just in the life of an adventuress but for an entire era. (Nov.) (c)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Bookmarks Magazine

Critics admired Steve Martin for being a Renaissance man—after all, there are few comedians and actors who are also serious (and successful) writers. And most agreed that An Object of Beauty, more than a simple comic tale, is both a smart satire and a serious novel of manners. Martin shares his ample knowledge of Lacey’s profession and the art world; indeed, his ruminations enlightened more than a few reviewers. Some critics, however, found the novel lacking. Complaints ranged from flat prose to a confused plot, a nearly invisible first person narrator, an unlikable Lacey, some tangential plot lines, and prosaic discussions of art. Still, even the detractors admitted that the book’s premise “is a good one, filled with all sorts of juicy potential” (Guardian). In the end, An Object of Beauty, enhanced by color reproductions of famous paintings, should delight most readers—art aficionados or not.

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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Grand Central Publishing; 1st edition (November 23, 2010)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0446573647
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0446573641
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.3 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.25 x 1 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #903,198 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #4,976 in Fiction Urban Life
- #10,867 in Coming of Age Fiction (Books)
- #49,805 in Literary Fiction (Books)

Customer Reviews:
507 ratings

About the author

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Steve Martin

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Steve Martin is one of today's most talented performers. His huge successes as a film actor include such credits as ROXANNE, FATHER OF THE BRIDE, PARENTHOOD and THE SPANISH PRISONER. He has won Emmys for his television writing and two Grammys for comedy albums. In addition to the bestselling PURE DRIVEL, he has written several plays, including Picasso at the Lapin Agile and a highly acclaimed novel, SHOPGIRL. His work appears in The New Yorker and The New York Times.

Author photo (c) Sandee Oliver

Customer reviews

5 star		56%
4 star		22%
3 star		12%
2 star		5%
1 star		6%

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Top reviews from the United States

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AntDina

Why is Steve Martin such an effen genious

Reviewed in the United States on June 17, 2019

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This book reads like a modern gum-shoe novel with an upgrade in intelligence wrapped around an elevated topic. The mystery is fair bit more subtle than gum-shoe, but the use of metaphors is superb. I have gifted 10 copies: 4 for art friends who understand the world of galleries and auction houses. 6 for my writing coaches. All this from a guy who entered the public consciousness with an arrow in his head on Johnny Carson. I hate him. I love him.

Oh Steve, what else do you plan to master? Comedy. Dramatic film. Banjo with Edie. And now the Cyrano of the modern novel. Eff you! Can I buy you a drink?

14 people found this helpful

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Dot2Trot

Loved this book so much I might marry it

Reviewed in the United States on December 27, 2019

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Really loved this book. Loved this window into the art world, and all the complicated/flawed characters coexisting in it. The writing quality was superb, and I hope Steve M. keeps writing books. He's basically 4 kinds of geniuses all in one body, and I think the best one's the "author" genius. Love his other stuff too, but his books are the best.

8 people found this helpful

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Book Lover

Classic intellectual Steve Martin

Reviewed in the United States on September 3, 2015

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A novel about the art world in New York, about it's simplicity, it's complexity, and it's pretentiousness, about it's moral high grounds and lack of morality. I read it with the laptop nearby so I could pull up samples of all the art not shown in the book, my lack of knowledge fairly evident. I was not drawn to any of the characters in the book except Patrice, and yet, I loved the book. It made me feel completely stupid about art, and yet I still loved the book. Steve Martin has such a precision in his writing, weaves such an atmosphere, even though you're in your raggedy pajamas, laying in bed with hair still wet from the shower, you have no problem feeling that you're moving around a gallery, sipping on wine, noshing on pretentious hors d'œuvres, and making pithy comments about art, trying to cover up the fact you have no idea WTF the artist was thinking.

15 people found this helpful

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David A. Gustafson

Serve Martin at his best

Reviewed in the United States on December 25, 2016

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A delightful novel that takes the reader into the shallow world of art collecting. While some people may have the sensitivity to appreciate what others can do with a brush, others measure the merits of an artist in terms of dollars...potential return on investment. Martin knows this world and displays an unexpected knowledge of art, museums and the kinds of people who wander the galleries and auctions in search of greatness through ownership. It's a wonderful tour and an exciting adventure that gives rise to a desire to own something, anything that might reflect on our sensitivities to color and composition that is far beyond the abilities of most of us to ever achieve. A truly enjoyable read, laced with penetrating insights and trademark Martin humor. But then he does own an Edward Hopper....

6 people found this helpful

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Finery_Fox

Wonderful story. So worth the read.

Reviewed in the United States on October 29, 2017

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Serious and beautiful, this is a boom to read when you want to feel educated and lost in the words of a master wordsmith.

I was wrapped in the reeling of a young woman at the top of her craft. I was lead to both hate and love this siren of the Art World. Her struggles and her triumphs were both nourishing and brutal, and they called me to want that life as much as I have water anything.

Twists and mystery also accompany her, and you will not be disappointed. Sex and the City meets Lipstick Jungle, but written by a literary mind.

This is how I would want to write, and I didn't want it to ever end.

4 people found this helpful

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Turin

Adriot characterization and wonderful insights

Reviewed in the United States on May 25, 2011

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Steve Martin has been a cultural phenomena for 35 years. In this time one imagines he has had access to successive generations glitterati and intelligentsia. Parties from NY or Hollywood and European capitals.

After seeing the life arcs of hundreds (thousands?) of the best and brightest, Martin is able to draw his characters, even the minor ones, in a way that is idiosyncratic, novel and yet entirely convincing. This is not one of those novels where the characterization is so thin that it is little more than a name and a line or two of back story on the author's legal pad and they move around like automatons in service of the plot.

There are numerous points where a character might do or say something that comes as a surprise to the reader. Then in a moments reflection it makes perfect sense for them. For instance, in one scene the main character and her Parisian boy friend are going to eat in his swanky hotel room. She suggest they go down to the bar for a drink first. He logically says that they could just order up drinks with room service. She replies "Yes, but then no one will see how great we look". Them leaving the hotel room and coming back has no plot purpose. It doesn't advance anything. It would strike the reader who was in the situation as a silly thing to do and a bother. And yet in a minute you realize that this is precisely the kind of thing this character would do. Being a spectacle is a pleasure and a motivation to her.

The kind of beauty and attraction that the main character has is obviously ephemeral- underscored by the fact that her grandmother who was an artist's model is now elderly and dying.

Martin plays with this theme in the book- is there an inherent value to beauty and art? Certianly the "value" of art reflected by the prices is ephemeral too. Styles come and go in popularity and there are Art Booms and Art Busts, but even value of a single paining is non-empirical: it is simply based on the perception that someone else wants the painting more than you. In one scene, Lacey herself engineers false bidding at an auction, without which there wouldn't have been any "value" to her painting at all.

So Lacey is a beautiful thing who bargains and deals in Beautiful Things. Over the course of the novel the value of both will wax and wane.

The novel is essentially a review of the life of an 'up-and-comer' in the Big City in the '90s and '00s. You have heard similar stories in banking, stock market or even Big Law. The fact that Martin has set his story in the Art world, and no the grungy alt stuff either, during the last boom makes it seem very fresh and very unexpected. And it makes a wonderful panoply that the reader will enjoy.

Also noteworthy are the 10 or so pictures of paintings in-line to the text that Martin has added. So when the polt involves a James Tissot painting there is a picture of it. These arent critical to the work, but they are a nice touch and let the reader see why the characters might be so struck by a work or why the characters are saying a work is such a departure from a previous style. On my Kindle these came across reasonably well although I am not sure if they are color in a physical book. In any event, they were an actual addition and quickly promote some sidebar research on wikipedia.

The reader will enjoy they wonderful (I'd say world class) characterization and the very knowledgeable and carefully drawn portrait of the art world and its inhabitants. The writing is similar to the light humorous tone in Shopgirl.

The only downside is that plot, which flirts with being an art world mystery, ends on a note that is more cerebral than it is an action crescendo. Some might find that the way narrative peters out (however true to life) verses an actual climax a bit of a disappointment. However the pleasures of the novel's other attractions are likely to outweigh this for most readers.

7 people found this helpful

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Jolly DT

Four Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 6, 2018

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Beautifully written story. Homage to art and to New York.

Christoph Falley

Nice try...

Reviewed in Germany on February 11, 2021

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To get that clear first: I absolutely respect and adore Mr. Martin's skills as a comedian and his gift as an actor, most of the films were not the stuff I prefer, but that was more a question of direction, camera and script...
Getting to this book: brilliant idea, combining financial and arts world in their routine to make of any subject of human worth and beauty an object of value. But is it only due to the overdose of classic novels from Margaret Atwood I had this year that I miss so many writing skills? In the first third I felt always the author yelling for a producer to make a great movie of the story, more and more I felt disgusted with rarely necessary explicit sex scenes, and in the obviously most important final third it became all so very predictable...when Mr. Martin, finally, dares to move his eyes from the flesh and lust of Lacey biking, suddenly using all the convenience phrases of birds, sunrays and windstreams, you just ask yourself "well, what's the catastrophe coming up?" - ah, yessir, it's September 2001, well done, haha! To be continued with Lehman Brothers and financial crash, all obvious and predictable, okay, with great actors like Humphrey Bogart or Steve Martin fine stuff for the silver screen, but as a novel? Diet Coke compared to Mrs. Atwood's Champagne :)

One person found this helpful

Amazon Customer

Sort of Dickensian

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 29, 2011

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I enjoyed reading this book. I interpreted it as a sort of Dickensian description of the contemporary art world. One of the good things about the book is that it teaches you a bit about the artists involved in this world. I gave it four stars as it lacked some of the aspects of Dickens, for example his anger.

Elisabeth Hewson

Ein Schauspieler, der schreiben kann! Höchst interessant.

Reviewed in Germany on October 27, 2019

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Sehr interessanter Einblick in den Kunstmarkt. Steve Martin scheint genau zu wissen, wovon er schreibt.

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beq

Wistful and intriguing

Reviewed in Australia on September 5, 2018

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My favourite book of all time. Wistful and intriguing I loved Steve Martin’s narrative style.

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