cover image An Artful Corpse

An Artful Corpse

Helen A. Harrison. Poisoned Pen, $14.99 trade paper (336p) ISBN 978-1-7282-1403-0

Set in 1967, Harrison’s timely final installment in her Corpse trilogy (after 2020’s An Accidental Murder) offers an inside look at New York’s Art Students’ League during the social and political upheavals of the period. Timothy Juan “TJ” Fitzgerald, the 19-year-old son of the married NYPD detectives from the previous book, enrolls in the Art Students League as he tries to decide between pursuing a career as an artist and following in his parents’ footsteps as a law enforcement officer. TJ, who’s also a sophomore at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, is quickly swept into the controversy that inevitably follows in the wake of the combative regional artist Thomas Hart Benton—a culture clash that pits intellectuals against populists. What begins as a war of words escalates to murder, and TJ sets out to prove the innocence of a fellow student who’s the prime suspect. The author’s convincing portrait of 1960s Bohemian life makes up for the somewhat perfunctory sleuthing. Readers will hope that Harrison, the director of the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center, will soon be back with another mystery combining crime and art history. (Mar.)