Tiepolo Blue

Set in the mid-90s, Tiepolo Blue follows Don Lamb, professor of art history at Peterhouse, Cambridge, who has led a life so attenuated he knows little or nothing of the world outside of his college until he’s thrust onto the London gallery circuit.

Don caught the eye of Valentine Black, two decades his senior, on his first day as an undergraduate. Now an acknowledged Tiepolo expert, he’s appalled when the new Master approves an installation in the college quadrangle, dismissing it as nothing but a heap of rubbish. Asked to give his opinions on a radio arts programme, Don hesitates but is spurred on by Val with disastrous results. Val offers a way out: the directorship of a Dulwich gallery plus the use of his own house full of beautiful pieces. Hopelessly naïve, Don steps on any number of toes, convinced of his own expertise. By the end of the novel, his life has unravelled in spectacular fashion.

Cahill skewers the art world nicely and the pompous vanity of academia is excruciatingly well portrayed. There’s a sadness about such narrow, unlived lives in which sexuality is barely acknowledged, kept under wraps or portrayed in an exaggerated self-hating manner, made all the more poignant by its comic depiction. I’d guessed what was happening about halfway through this clever, neatly constructed tragicomedy but it still had me gripped, wondering when the penny would drop for Don.

From within the soporific world of Cambridge academia events conspire to rouse Don, a Professor of the History of Art, to a new awareness. Insulated by years of repressed feelings both emotional and physical make for a rather uncomfortable transformation.....deftly guided by Val, his long time friend and colleague. Outside of Peterhouse, Don finds a certain clarity, sharp and disturbing, almost overwhelming with possibilities. This is a journey with Don, discovering that after repression, too much freedom can result in an explosion of colour and noise and that even with careful measurement the skies of Tiepolo Blue can come tumbling down. A book to be read at least twice and remebered long after.

A rich and stimulating read.
Much respected in the rarefied atmosphere of Porterhouse College, Cambridge, art historian, Prof Don Lamb in his forties, leads a charmed life. Free to indulge his specialisation, he is writing the definitive study of the skies of the Venetian artist Tiepolo. Never short of academic stimulation and company, and a confirmed bachelor, he pleases himself. Quirky, a snob and judgementally sailing through his privileged life, there is nothing much to endear him to the reader. Until the appearance of a contemporary art installation on the lawns of Peterhouse offend him deeply and he becomes utterly lost.
By the end, he is a tragic, heartbreaking figure. Skilfully handled, Cahill takes us into both the public and private worlds of Prof Lamb. No longer automatically accepted and indulged, but mocked and disgraced as he makes one drunken, drug-fuelled blunder after another. His behaviour becomes increasingly self-destructive and he begins to realise some painful truths; and his tragic fall is complete.
Thank you to #NetGalley and #Hodder&Stoughton, for my free download in return for an honest review.

This is an absolute masterpiece of a book that I'm not entirely sure I have the words to recommend enough.
Enthralling, captivating and magnificent, it tells of the downfall of Don Lamb - a stuffy, judgemental, yet painfully naive art historian at Peterhouse, Cambridge following the installation of a controversial sculpture in one of the quads. His fall from grace is marked with duplicitous friendships, sexual reckoning, hubris, and obsession -- all set against the backdrop of London's art world of the 1990s. Hopping from intense relationship to intense relationship amongst a cast filled with compellingly written and truly unlikeable characters, the book is imbued with a spiralling unravelling of tragedy and destruction. Simultaneously uncomfortable and a gripping tragicomedy, it is magnificent -- A Picture of Dorian Gray meets Forster meets Waugh, reinvented for the 21st century.

As someone just graduating from a degree in art history and beginning my forays into the world of art and academia in London, I found it particularly entertaining as I could recognise so much within the people, places and quarrelling relationships that Cahill captures. Truly fantastic.

Thank you to Hodder and NetGalley for the free e-book in exchange for my honest review :)

I almost gave up on this book about a quarter of the way through. But I a so glad that I didn’t! It took me a while to really get into but once I did I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Although don was a remarkably pompous and unlikeable character to begin with, you grow to both love and respect him as he flounders through life with gross naivety.

I don’t know or particularly care about art, however this book read like a piece of artwork in itself, and I couldn’t have wanted more than the beautiful tragic ending we were given.

This novel, set in the 1990s, is about a Cambridge academic, art historian and defender of all things Classical Professor Don Lamb, who experiences a set of events which force him to leave his cloistered scholarly life and embark on a new existence in London. Through the machinations of fellow university don and mentor Valentine Black, he swiftly becomes director of Brockwell Museum and takes residence in Dulwich, a London suburb almost as unreal and static as Cambridge. However, thanks to his new-found freedom, he soon encounters a world his former life had screened him from and starts to question his previously blinkered views on art, the world and his relationships. I cannot recommend this novel enough. It is brilliantly written, sometimes funny, constantly thought-provoking and really quite gripping. It’s not often I get to read such a good novel.

Tiepolo Blue tells the story of a naive, old-before-his-years Cambridge professor, Don Lamb, whose passion is the Italian artist, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo. Having lived and worked in a Cambridge college since he was a student Don is unaware of life outside academia and when he suddenly loses his job he gradually loses sight of reality.

Set during the early 1990s this is a beautifully written book about a closet gay. Don is manipulated all the while by Val, his best friend and ex-tutor who finds him a new job as Director of a prestigious small art gallery in Dulwich. Val insists that Don lives in his magnificent house a walk away from the Gallery and Brockwell Park and Lido,

Not only does Don take to drink but he leads the gallery into disrepute and an assistant director is installed by Val (as a member of the governing body) to keep Don in check. This incenses Don but numerous attempts to reach Val to complain are ignored. As a reader I was hoping that Don would somehow redeem himself but once he indulges in his passion for Ben, a young artist, you know all will not end well.

This is a character-driven novel but so much happens as Don stumbles through one self-imposed crisis to another that no further plot is needed. The descriptions are excellent and the atmosphere is as dark as one expects. I was surprised that Aids wasn't mentioned, except obliquely, as it was certainly rife among gay men at that time. Also, the abruptness of the ending was a disappointment for me.

The style of writing and subject matter will no doubt bring comparisons with Alan Hollinghurst, but I feel that Tiepolo Blue, is much darker and more graphic in detail. It deserves to win prizes. Many thanks to NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for the opportunity to read and review this book.

An absolute masterpiece. Sumptuous descriptive writing and lovingly crafted work. I cannot think of a book I have enjoyed more.

The completely unexpected course of events kept me turning the pages.

Ejected from his safe yet stultifying academic life, the central character, Don, is an art historian who seems, like the stereotype of his scholarly kind, to be as stunningly naive about life as he is is brilliant in his subject area.

It could be that his faithfulness to his studies at an age when he should have been experiencing sexual awakening has largely been the cause of this naivety. Later on, when we meet him, he is going out into the world to crash into a sort of mid-life-latent-adolescent crisis that he nevertheless embraces with poise, shored up by his understanding of classical art and its history.

His departure from academia was not entirely by choice but at the times when it seems that someone is pulling the strings that guide him through his new life, there is doubt caused by some event or other. Maybe things aren't orchestrated, it could just be other peoples' ignorance or folly that sets up some of the situations Don finds himself in. The sympathetic descriptions of the people he meets in his new role as a gallery director in London seem always to redeem them. They are as unworldly, in their ways, as Don was himself when he was cocooned by the traditions he has left behind.

There is a seamy and sordid side to Don's new life in the wide world, with descriptions that could have been crudely handled. No spoiler here, but hats off to the author for the way he deftly plumbed the depths of his character's latent sexuality without making me cringe.

The uncertainties are satisfyingly cleared up in the closing pages and, along the way, I revelled in the emotional journey and at the same time was introduced to some powerful themes around art.

A beautifully written story of the life of Don Lamb. Having been pushed out of Portherhouse at Cambridge university for standing up for his views about a new piece of art and having lived there since his graduation days, it is a culture shock to find himself living in London. This follows his story with the present day also revealing some of his past. It is a bitter sweet tale about sexuality, finding oneself and how other peoples manipulation can have such a negative effect on life. Some wonderful characters and written in such a style that you just want to keep turning the pages. Highly recommended.

What an amazing book!
The book is super exciting and would love to read more from the author!

Thankyou netgalley for the ARC

Could not put this book down. An addictive read. Beautiful writing and a pleasure to read.
Took a wee bit to get into it but it's worth the perseverance