Behind the Canvas - Hardcover

Vance, Alexander

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1250029708 ISBN 13: 9781250029706

Publisher: Feiwel & Friends, 2016

Synopsis

There is a world behind the canvas. Past the paint of the canvas is a realm where art lives, breathes, creates, destroys.
Claudia Miravista loves art but only sees what is on the surface, until the Dutch boy Pim appears in her painting. Pim has been trapped in the world behind the canvas for centuries by a power-hungry witch, and now believes that Claudia is his only hope for escape. Fueled by the help of an ancient artist and some microwaveable magic, Claudia enters the wondrous and terrifying world, intent on destroying the witch's most cherished possession and setting Pim free. But in that world nothing is quite as it appears on the surface. Not even friendship.

About this title

About the Author

Alexander Vance's first novel, The Heartbreak Messenger, was praised by School Library Journal as a "clever read [that] will find an audience with both boys and girls" in a starred review. He works as a multimedia designer and lives in Western New York with his family.

From School Library Journal

Gr 5–8—Aiming to do for art history what Rick Riordan's "Percy Jackson" series (Disney-Hyperion) has done for Greek mythology, Vance's novel follows its 12-year-old protagonist, a budding artist named Claudia Miravista, into a world where famous artists and art iconography come to life as dynamic, idiosyncratic characters. When she unexpectedly spots a living boy, Pim, peering out from the background of a painting at the local museum, Claudia is unexpectedly drawn into both a friendship and an interdimensional conflict, which requires her to join Pim in a mysterious realm built by the imaginations of every major artist since the Renaissance. Initially bogged down by a great deal of explanatory setup (necessary to make such an abstract conceit stick), Vance's story flares to life when Claudia crosses into the canvas for the first time. Soon, she's trading gossip with the Mona Lisa, befriending one of C.M. Coolidge's poker-playing dogs, and running from a particularly frightening Max Ernst creation—all to free Pim from the clutches of an evil artist-witch named Nee Gezicht. Helped along by tongue-in-cheek footnotes from a fictional art encyclopedia, adventurous readers will end up learning a great deal about art history along the way. VERDICT A conventional misfit-turned-hero tale elevated by an inspired concept.—Abigail Garnett, Brooklyn Public Library

Edition details

• Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 1250029708
• ISBN 13: 9781250029706
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 336