The Gauguin Connection (Book 1) (Genevieve Lenard)

What they discover reaches the highest levels of the government, touches on crime lords and arms dealers and will change Genevieve's life forever.Most of the action takes place in two rooms. The mystery is solved mostly by computer work led by the way Genevieve thinks and her talent for reading people in videos and finding patterns. I found Genevieve's thought processes interesting but this book might not be for someone who likes explosions and bombs and more physical action. There is also a lot of detail in this book. It is very fascinating but there is quite a lot of repetition. The way Genevieve can read body language, her aversion to touch and her inability to understand slang and figures of speech are explained over and over again to the reader. Genevieve's coping mechanisms are also described repeatedly. I do believe that this book could have a lot of the repetition edited out and it would be better for it. I didn't mind this too much and it didn't distract from my enjoyment of the book but it it worth mentioning.The characters are what made me really like this book. They are fantastic. Each one is truly believable. I think the author did a fantastic job of writing the entire book through Genevieve's autistic point of view. All the characters grow and we learn just enough about their pasts to be intrigued. I liked each of them considerably and want to know more about each one.The plot of the book is complicated. There are a lot of moving parts, and a lot of lists. I was satisfied with the ending of this book and didn't realize until I was thinking about it later that not all of the questions were answered. There is an ending to the mystery and we know who the bad guy is but a few of the little details that were brought up in the book were not answered.This was a character driven novel that I really did enjoy. I actually found myself reading to see more of the interactions between the different characters then more about the mystery itself. I will be reading the second one just to meet these characters again.

Genevieve is LuminousBy Bob Gelms I love beginnings, the beginnings of anything really but especially the beginnings of beloved literary characters. Such is the case with Genevieve Lenard, a vivid character created by Estelle Ryan. Genevieve is featured in a series that has reached 10 installments with more to come.The Gauguin Connection is the first book where we meet her and her friends. It is a primer on how it is possible for unscrupulous men in the art world to turn something as innocuous, beautiful, and comforting as art into an occasion of sin including fraud, forgery, murder and enough international intrigue to make you an expert in European political science. It seems some countries in Europe occasionally don’t like one another and, believe it or not, some of them still bear enormous resentment toward the Germans for what they did to Europe during WWII. Dropped into the middle of all this is an unassuming insurance investigator, Genevieve Lenard, who works for an insurance company that specializes in covering high value art. She tries to keep a low profile but is asked by her boss to take a special interest in this case. She is not happy about it and tries to get out of it. She fails. Genevieve is a very special human being, a very high functioning Autistic. She has incredible abilities that come with a price. Her IQ is off the charts and she has the uncanny ability to instantly interpret body language, which, apparently, will tell you all you need to know about your subject’s emotional state and whether or not they are lying.Genevieve can see connections between things that other people cannot, which is most useful. She is able to make stunning connections between disparate pieces of information and is correct about 90% of the time. She is a perfect detective but, alas, there are some significant speed bumps in her life including a difficult time in social settings, communicating with people and understanding similes or metaphors (her friends eventualy figure this out). She abhors being touched and only trusts one person in the whole world, her boss. She has problems gathering information the old fashion way but she is an expert at researching on the internet where she doesn’t have to interact with a real person face to face. And, I saved this for last because it’s something you should know, she’s drop dead gorgeous. Consequently, all the attention she gets is entirely unwanted and causes her mountains of anxiety. The Gauguin Connection revolves around a complicated caper involving forged famous paintings and murder. A group of people are controlling art auctions of paintings that have been newly recovered from Nazi thievery. The cabal has scoured art schools to find the world’s most talented students before they get any recognition in the public eye. These students are commissioned to forge a piece of famous art and then they are killed to keep the secret. The paintings are so good it would take one of a handful of experts to tell they were forgeries. The paintings are sold at auction on a sea cruise in international waters where the laws, if they were caught, are legally murky. Yes, you guessed it! Genevieve’s company insured or insures most of these paintings. She works for a very old company that has paid out a lot of money. Gauguin’s painting, Still Life With White Bowl”, has been found to be a forgery and the forger has been murdered. Her company insures the painting and this is the motivation for her company and ultimately Genevieve to investigate the forgeries. She has help. She doesn’t want it. She REALLY doesn’t want it. First is a thoroughly annoying man from one of the European Union’s police agencies. He’s the official investigator. Then she has forced upon her two mysterious guys one of whom she is sure is a criminal in it for reasons she can’t quite divine. The other is a giant powerful man, Vinnie, who is a conundrum of paradoxes. These three give Genevieve fits, mostly because her special talents don’t seem to work all the time when they are watching her. The case leads to some very powerful people and some very dangerous places. I learned about art and autism and was introduced to a lady with whom I’m infatuated. I loved The Gauguin Connection and intend to start reading the other nine books in the series. I’m told they don’t have to be read in chronological order. They are all about artists and crimes surrounding their art. Pick your favorite artist and have at it. Genevieve Lenard is luminous.

This is easily a 5* story but let down with a 3.5* presentation, I'd say, so I can only give 4* on an average. What a shame as I loved the story and the great characters she's created. I do feel a little aggrieved at some of the reviewers bleating about Genevieve not being totally true to the life of someone with her condition. It's fiction, for goodness' sake and I didn't feel I lost out, since I wasn't wanting to read a book about Autism or Asperger's or whatever she has. That's just her background. So I'd ignore that sort of review, personally. If I had thought the book was going to be on about that all the time, I wouldn't have bothered with it, trust me.Got that off my chest now......it was highly interesting learning how she managed to cope when her world was turned upside-down due to a case she's ordered to work on. She does so many things she wouldn't usually do and it was very funny in places as well. I really like both Colin and Vinnie and Phillip, her boss, is a prince. I hope they're all going to feature in her next adventure which I already have downloaded. One line near the end featuring another guy called Manny was so touching it also made me quite sniffy....I did find myself a little bogged down in the final quarter as it was getting very convoluted and I needed to flick back 'n' forth a few times as I was getting a little confused as to how many artists there were, etc. This passage totally baffled me-"I frowned at Piros' name in the box with the extra angry lines surrounding it. His connection to this case was tenuous and it was easy enough to find him. Piros, on the other hand, was exceptionally adept at remaining an enigma"......I'm assuming the wrong name was used twice when it shouldn't have been.Now errors.....way too many apostrophe ones nobody spotted and corrected, especially where plurals are concerned-226's/VIP's and every time, save one, she missed it out on weapons' theft !!! BUT, massive kudos for being the only author I've spotted to get it right on hornets' nest !! I made a special note of that because everyone usually gets that one wrong for some strange reason.This line had an extra word-"I'd had only had academic knowledge" and this one lost one-"It wasn't a one-man job, so I asked Vinnie's help." Yet this passage makes no sense because one word has been misplaced or missed or something. Whatever it is, it's wrong as it stands-"One word combined all the loose bits of information to a state of completion where all my observations, analyses and theories into one single conclusion."There was used and not their at one point and boar and not bore. She has a habit of writing born and not borne, too. Then gentleman and not gentlemen and very annoyingly, and carelessly, a big event they planned to attend on a Saturday was suddenly talked about occurring on a Friday !! Men's wear is usually just the one word-menswear and enveloped was written in place of envelope.I hope she'll invest in a better editor or proofreader in the next story as these mistakes really ought to have been picked up if I managed to spot them !!

Asperger's Syndrome 'sufferer' Genevieve Lenard is a partner in Rousseau & Rousseau, an Art Insurance company, with Phillip who's protective of her, as she lives alone. Genevieve's condition causes her to hyperfocus on body language and this makes her a valuable asset when she acts as special consultant to EDF,[a national security department led by Colonel Manny Millard] and Interpol in this thrilling story by Estelle Ryan.When a dead female artist turns up with a strip from a Gaugin painting in her coat, Genevieve's talents are in demand. She also needs to help Manny and Leon uncover the truth about this and a number of other young artists' murders, believed to be carried out with stolen Europcorps weapons that are untraceable and all linked to Art auctions carried out on Russian-registered ships.Who is Colin Frey and how does he come into Genevieve's flat - and her life?What is his career/real lifestyle? What is the connection between Colin, stolen/returned artworks and the murdered artists? How does Genevieve react when stressed? Who attacks her at her home? Who becomes her live-in bodyguard? Who is Francine and how does she help Genevieve and Colin in their search? How is the master-crook unmasked?Once you start the Genevieve Lenard series, of which this is the exciting first novel, you're sure to be hooked on the interesting way her 'handicap' becomes a positive inspiration for those she works and is induced to socialise with. I heartily recommend it to the intelligent fan of murder-mysteries with an unusual feisty protagonist leading a major investigation.I loved this story and I'm sure you will too - grab a copy today and be sure to tell all your friends not to miss it either!

I was interested in the setting and the plot of this story.When I began reading there seemed to be a lot of repetition around Genevieve's condition, such as how she disliked being touched. I appreciate that the novel is written from her viewpoint but I felt this began to intrude on the plotline because the points were made so often I felt that Estelle was trying to teach us about autism not tell a story. There also seemed to be inconsistencies such as Genevieve's ability to use her computer for research but not understanding other aspects of computer use.The detail around communication difficulties made me wonder how much research had been done - as an English reader I found Vinnie's need to use slang constantly was not credible. When I reached the section about an injection of Midazolam I began to wonder how much Estelle relied on inaccurate information rather than factual research - I have nursed patients undergoing medical procedures when midazolam has been used to provide sedation and amnesia and assure you that such an injection does not cause paralysis and memory is lost for the period whilst the drug is working (especially as it was queried that Genevieve might have been given an overdose).At 45% I have given up and deleted this from my library.

Estelle Ryan was born in South Africa. She has worked for a number of magazines, as a writer and an editor and she seems to spend a great deal of her time travelling. Apparently she writes the majority of her books in coffeeshops, which is one way of cutting down on the heating bills at home."The Gauguin Connection" is the first book in Genevieve Lenard series. Genevieve is a psychology graduate who specialises in nonverbal communication and behaviour. She also has a form of autism - inter-personal relationships can be tricky and, when panicked, she calms herself by writing one of Mozart's works. (This can lead to her for zoning out for hours at a time). Genevieve works for Rousseau and Rousseau, an insurance firm based in Strasbourg that provides cover for extremely expensive artwork. Her boss, Phillip Rousseau, is pretty much the only person she has a close relationship with - he's able to act as a buffer between her and other people."The Gauguin Connection" sees Genevieve working in a somewhat different sphere to normal. Manfred Millard, a close friend of Phillip, is a senior official at the European Defence Agency - and he needs help. A girl has been found murdered in Strasbourg by a Russian, who arrived in France with a number of apparently legitimate identities. The murder weapon had been stolen from Eurocorps. Obviously there's a suspicion that someone at a high level in Eurocorps is involved. However, the EDA has also been implicated. Worryingly for Rousseau and Rousseau, a strip of a painting was found on the murder victim's body - specifically The White Bowl, by Paul Gauguin, which is insured by the company. As the owner hasn't reported it missing, Phillip is concerned they may actually have insured a high-quality forgery. However, the first concern is the murder investigation and - because of the possibility of insiders at both Eurocorps and the EDA - an outsider needs to be brought in. That outsider, despite her great reluctance, is going to be Genevieve.I did find it a little difficult to take parts of the story seriously. (The relationship Genevieve formed so quickly with Colin, in particular, was something I found hard to swallow - given her difficulties in dealing with people). I was a little disappointed with how little Strasbourg featured - so much of the book was took place indoors, it really could have been set anywhere. However, it was largely an enjoyable and easily read book - I could see myself trying another couple of books in the series.

I am hooked on all the characters in this book and will not be happy till I have read the whole series.Genevieve the main character also known as Doctor Lenard is a face reader for simple terms, who is a genius who has no social skills other than the ones she has taught herself, through observation, has four new characters come into her life at the some time she is investigating a series of art crimes. So you are continually in her heads as she attempts to solve the crimes and adjust to people in her life that want to help and befriend her. Truly a joyful and educational read of our behavioural patterns. A must read