A Thriller for the Arts in The Secret Courtesan by Kerry Chaput

My guest today is Kerry Chaput, author of The Secret Courtesan, listed in the Visual Arts category on Art In Fiction.

Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/fkX-QqvmnQg

• Premise for the novel: how a marble Venetian sculpture, surfacing after 400 years and credited to a male artist, sends Mia, a modern-day arts authenticator looking for the woman she is sure had carved it.
• Kerry found documented women painters of the Renaissance and Baroque, but no large-scale women sculptors, and decided that gap in the record was the story worth telling.
• Artemisia's dusty painting: the real-life rediscovery of an Artemisia Gentileschi painting in a Hampton Court storage room, proof that misattributed women's art isn't just a plot device.
• Veronica Franco and the real courtesans: how the film Dangerous Beauty and its real-life subject, Renaissance Venice's premier courtesan, inspired the character of Sofia, and why courtesans had more freedom, education, and political access than "respectable" women of the era.
• Pitched as The Da Vinci Code with a feminist twist: the puzzles and cliffhangers built into Mia's modern timeline, and why Kerry had to finish writing Sofia's 1609 story before she could solve Mia's.
• Zero outline, one nice bow: Kerry's pantser process from first page to last, alternating between timelines and following "wormholes" even when they lead nowhere.
• The hardest research wasn't the history: why untangling art authentication, auction houses, and international law was tougher than 17th-century Venice, and how friends in the art world helped her build a plausible Sotheby's-style plot.
• A law against something means someone was doing it: the logic behind laws barring women from studying art and obtaining materials, and what that says about who was quietly doing both anyway.
• Writing women who already have a voice: why Kerry skipped the "she finds her voice" arc for Sofia, and how a story about a woman claiming power she already has changes the whole shape of the narrative.
• Reading from The Secret Courtesan: a 2 a.m. library scene between Mia and fellow historian Noah as her theory about the sculptor's true identity finally comes out.
• What's next: Kerry's ongoing Substack, Badass Women in History, and her continued fascination with the women the historical record left out.

Read more from Kerry Chaput on her Substack, Badass Women in History: https://kerrychaput.substack.com/

Are you enjoying The Art In Fiction Podcast? Consider giving us a small donation so we can continue bringing you interviews with your favorite arts-inspired novelists.  Click this link to donate: https://ko-fi.com/artinfiction.

Also, check out Art In Fiction at https://www.artinfiction.com and explore 2500+ novels inspired by the arts in 11 categories: Architecture, Dance, Decorative Arts, Film, Literature, Music, Photography, Textile Arts, Theater, Visual Arts, & Other.

Want to learn more about Carol Cram, the host of The Art In Fiction Podcast? She's the author of several award-winning novels, including The Towers of Tuscany, A Woman of Note, The Muse of Fire, and The Choir. Check out her website...