Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

No artist has been more ruthlessly driven by his creative urge, nor more isolated by it from most ordinary sources of human happiness, than Vincent Van Gogh. A painter of genius, his life was an incessant struggle against poverty, discouragement, madness and despair. Lust for Life skilfully captures the exciting atmosphere of the Paris of the Post-Impressionists and reconstructs with great insight the development... (more)

North of Beautiful

by Justina Chen Headley

As he continued to stare, I wanted to point to my cheek and remind him, But you were the one who wanted this, remember? You're the one who asked-and I repeat- Why not fix your face? It's hard not to notice Terra Cooper. She's tall, blond, and has an enviable body. But with one turn of her cheek, all people notice is her unmistakably "flawed" face. Terra secretly plans to leave her stifling small town in... (more)

Harley, Like a Person

by Cat Bauer

Fourteen-year-old Harley Columba is convinced she's adopted. She's nothing like her abusive, alcoholic father or her bitter, romance novel-reading mother. They have brown eyes, but Harley's eyes are blue . They argue and drink and thrive in dreary suburbia while Harley paints, writes poetry, and longs for a different family and a better life. But then she finds a new, startling piece of evidence: a harlequin doll... (more)

The Painted Kiss : A Novel

by Elizabeth Hickey

Vienna in 1886 was a city of beautiful architecture, elegant cafes, grand opera houses and a thriving and adventurous artistic community. It was there that twelve-year-old Emilie Floege met the controversial libertine and painter Gustav Klimt. THE PAINTED KISS follows the developing relationship between the moody, brilliant Klimt and Emilie, who blossoms from a naive young girl to a sanguine older woman, becoming... (more)

The Time Traveler's Wife

by Audrey Niffenegger

A dazzling novel in the most untraditional fashion, this is the remarkable story of Henry DeTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who travels involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist whose life takes a natural sequential course. Henry and Clare's passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap, and it is Audrey Niffenegger's... (more)

Girl with a Pearl Earring

by Tracy Chevalier, Tracy(Author) Chevalier, Tracy(Author) Chevalier, Tracy(Author) Chevalier, Tracy Chevlier

The runaway New York Times bestseller with over one million copies sold Now a major motion picture from Lions Gate Films opening November 2003 History and fiction merge seamlessly in Tracy Chevalier's luminous novel about artistic vision and sensual awakening. Through the eyes of sixteen-year-old Griet, the world of 1660s Holland comes dazzlingly alive in this richly imagined portrait of the young... (more)

The Picture of Dorian Gray

by Oscar Wilde

The Picture of Dorian Gray , by Oscar Wilde , is part of the Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics : New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and... (more)

Life Mask

by Emma Donoghue

The bestselling author of Slammerkin vividly brings to life the Beau Monde of late eighteenth-century England, turning the private drama of three celebrated Londoners into a robust, full-bodied portrait of a world on the brink of revolution. In a time of looming war, of glittering spectacle and financial disasters, the wealthy liberals of the Whig Party work to topple a tyrannical prime minister and a lunatic... (more)

Alive and Well in Prague, New York

by Daphne Grab

Matisse Osgood is a New York City girl through and through. She buys her clothes at Andy's Cheapies, watches indie films at the Angelika, and wouldn't be caught dead on a hayride. But when her father gets sick and Matisse's parents decide to leave Man-hattan for a small town in upstate New York, her perfect world crumbles. As Matisse trudges through life in Prague, she dreams of waking up in her apartment on West... (more)

Church of the Dog

by Kaya McLaren

Mara, a physically gifted art teacher, lives in the old employee quarters behind the McRae House in exchange for helping Earl McRae fix his fences. Earl, an old rancher set in his ways, is intent upon spending his last days putting his affairs in order and waltzing the hours by with his beloved wife, Edith. Eager to live adventurously at every age, Edith continues to entice Earl with fresh roses in her hair and... (more)

Sketches

by Eric Walters

After fleeing her home, suburban-bred Dana struggles to survive in the alleys, squats, and subway stations of downtown Toronto. Dana’s graffiti on an underpass catches the eye of a counselor at Sketches, a drop-in center where homeless teens can express themselves through art. As Dana works on a painting, she begins to confront the reason she left home. The truth of what her stepfather did to her is trying to... (more)

Discoveries: Leonardo da Vinci (Discoveries (Abrams))

Discoveries: Leonardo da Vinci (Discoveries (Abrams))

by Alessandro Vezzosi

Leonardo da Vinci was one of the most outstanding intellectuals of the Renaissance. An entirely self taught intellectual giant, he was endlessly curious about the physical world. His notebooks reveal the breadth of his research into subjects as diverse as anatomy, botany, physics, and engineering, including his extraordinary anticipation of modern technology. The author traces his life from birth through to his... (more)

The Art Lesson (Paperstar Book)

by Tomie dePaola

Having learned to be creative in drawing pictures at home, young Tommy is dismayed when he goes to school and finds the art lesson there much more regimented.

Harley's Ninth

by Cat Bauer

Sixteen-year-old Harley Columba knows that October 9th won't be an ordinary day. At 8:00 a.m. she stands on the pier and gazes at the Statue of Liberty, framed by the morning sun and the fading moon. This is the day her first art exhibit opens in a gallery in New York City. The day Harley and her friends will visit the Broadway set designed by her newfound father, the famous Sean Shanahan. The day she returns to... (more)

Dance Of The Scarecrows

by Sipherd

To renowned ornithologist and bird artist Jonathan Wilder, it is a situation that becomes more and more strange with each turn of events. First, a local politician with whom he had publicly argued is found dead in a cornfield, propped up like a scarecrow. Then it is realized that the murder weapon not only is covered in Jonathan's fingerprints, but came from his house. Once he becomes the prime suspect in the... (more)

Rainstone Fall

by Peter Helton

Praise for Peter Helton: "Fans of Jonathan Gash's Lovejoy will appreciate the scheme that Honeysett, who's a bit of a scalawag, concocts. . . . Readers will look forward to further installments in this off beat series."- Publishers Weekly "Sheer fun."- Booklist Chris Honeysett, an artist and private investigator, takes on a surveillance job to pay for repairs to his roof and finds himself faced with... (more)

The Artist's Way Morning Pages Journal

by Julia Cameron, Mark Bryan

The idea behind Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way is that by writing three pages, longhand and stream-of consciousness, first thing in the morning, you can overcome the obstacles that stop you from becoming your most creative self. This works partly because it forces you to create something (even if it is just a long list of gripes) every single day. It doesn't take much time. You're not even supposed to... (more)

The Art Book

by Adam Butler, Susan Stirling, Claire Van Cleave

Winner of the Illustrated Book of the Year award in 1994, The Art Book has become a publishing phenomenon and a well-known event in the art book world. Reduced in size, making it light and highly portable, this new mini edition presents the same easy-to-use alphabetical guide to 500 of the world's greatest painters and sculptors. 500 color illustrations.

Action Jackson (Single Titles)

by Jan Greenberg

One late spring morning the American artist Jackson Pollock began work on the canvas that would ultimately come to be known as Number 1, 1950 ( Lavender Mist ). Award-winning authors Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan use this moment as the departure point for a unique picture book about a great painter and the way in which he worked. Their lyrical text, drawn from Pollock's own comments and those made by members of... (more)

The Glass Castle

A Memoir

by Jeannette Walls

Jeannette Walls's father always called her "Mountain Goat" and there's perhaps no more apt nickname for a girl who navigated a sheer and towering cliff of childhood both daily and stoically. In The Glass Castle , Walls chronicles her upbringing at the hands of eccentric, nomadic parents--Rose Mary, her frustrated-artist mother, and Rex, her brilliant, alcoholic father. To call the elder Walls's childrearing... (more)

Shelfari Book Activity

Tags: artist

by Irving Stone

by Justina Chen Headley

by Cat Bauer

by Elizabeth Hickey

by Audrey Niffenegger

by Tracy Chevalier, Tracy(Author) Chevalier, Tracy(Author) Chevalier, Tracy(Author) Chevalier, Tracy Chevlier

by Oscar Wilde

by Emma Donoghue

by Daphne Grab

by Kaya McLaren

by Eric Walters

by Alessandro Vezzosi

by Tomie dePaola

by Cat Bauer

by Sipherd

by Peter Helton

by Julia Cameron, Mark Bryan

by Adam Butler, Susan Stirling, Claire Van Cleave

by Jan Greenberg

A Memoir

by Jeannette Walls