PORTRAIT OF A THIEF by Grace D. Li

With a premise like this one, I couldn’t not read Portrait of a Thief by Grace D. Li, coming on April 5, 2022. The novel follows five Chinese American college students who plan to steal back Chinese art from Western museums. It has all the elements of a perfect heist: intricate planning, nail-biting break-ins, and a 50 million dollar payout. At the same time, Li presents a well rounded exploration of the Gen Z, Chinese American identity for all readers, regardless of background.

Will Chen, an art history student at Harvard, happens to be on shift at the Sackler Museum when a group of thieves steal a collection of Chinese art pieces. In the chaos, Will picks up one of the pieces for himself, and also finds an anonymous note with a phone number. He follows the note to Beijing, bringing along four others:

Irene Chen: Will’s sister, younger by one year. Public policy student at Duke.

Lily Wu: Irene’s roommate. Engineering student and the best street racer on campus.

Daniel Liang: childhood friend of Will and Irene. UCLA pre-med student.

Alex Huang: long ago Tinder date and now friend of Will. Dropped out of MIT to work at Google.

In Beijing, they meet Wang Yuling, the CEO of China Poly, who wants to hire them for a specific job: steal five art pieces from five different museums.

From the start, I knew that this heist book was unlike any other. If you are looking for a heist movie à la Ocean’s Eleven put on paper, this is not the one. There is no need to suspend your disbelief in order to witness amazing feats of tactical brilliance, because there aren’t any. Despite their determination and intelligence, these are just college kids, not professional thieves. Their planning and methods are questionable, so the successful heists are mostly due to good luck.

What is really special about Portrait of a Thief is what the heist means to the protagonists. Each of the five had a different experience growing up Chinese American, and thus different perspectives, emotions, and connections to Chinese history and culture. On one end of the spectrum is Daniel, who spent more than ten years of his childhood living in Beijing. On the other end is Lily, who was born in small-town Texas and whose parents have distanced themselves from the culture of their homeland. Chinese American readers like myself will see parts of themselves reflected in at least one of these characters. For readers with different backgrounds, Li demonstrates how the diasporic experience is not universal even within a specific diaspora. Ultimately, the book is less about heists and more about cultural connections, both personal and collective. Li’s writing style in illustrating these connections almost borders on flowery, but instead lends beautiful imagery and enhances the storytelling. I am so excited for this book to be published and will certainly be recommending it to all my friends.