The Frame-Up by Gwenda Bond – Review

Published: February 13, 2024

Publisher: Del Rey

Series: N/A

Genre: Fantasy, Romance

Pages: 353 (Kindle)

My Rating: 2.5 Stars

A copy of the book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Synopsis:
A magically gifted con artist must gather her estranged mother’s old crew for a once-in-a-lifetime heist, from the New York Times bestselling author of Stranger Suspicious Minds.

Dani Poissant is the daughter and former accomplice of the world’s most famous art thief, as well as being an expert forger in her own right. The secret to their success? A little thing called magic, kept rigorously secret from the non-magical world. Dani’s mother possesses the power of persuasion, able to bend people to her will, whereas Dani has the ability to make any forgery she undertakes feel like the genuine article.

At seventeen, concerned about the corrupting influence of her mother’s shadowy partner, Archer, Dani impulsively sold her mother out to the FBI—an act she has always regretted. Ten years later, Archer seeks her out, asking her to steal a particular painting for him, since her mother’s still in jail. In return, he will reconcile her with her mother and reunite her with her mother’s old gang—including her former best friend, Mia, and Elliott, the love of her life.

The problem is, it’s a nearly impossible job—even with the magical talents of the people she once considered family backing her up. The painting is in the never-before-viewed private collection of deceased billionaire William Hackworth—otherwise known as the Fortress of Art. It’s a job that needs a year to plan, and Dani has just over one week. Worse, she’s not exactly gotten a warm welcome from her former colleagues—especially not from Elliott, who has grown from a weedy teen to a smoking-hot adult. And then there is the biggest puzzle of why Archer wants her to steal a portrait of himself, which clearly dates from the 1890s, instead of the much more valuable works by Vermeer or Rothko. Who is her mother’s partner, really, and what does he want?

The more Dani learns, the more she understands she may be in way over her head—and that there is far more at stake in this job than she ever realized.

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I was super tempted by this book for a number of reasons, the main one being that it’s a heist novel and there’s also a border collie. How could I possibly resist magic art thieves with a cute canine sidekick? 

The Frame-Up follows Dani Poissant, the daughter of a notorious and now imprisoned art thief, Maria Poissant, as she takes on her first art-related job in years. After Dani turned on her mother and got her caught, the art crime scene had been but a distant memory until her mother’s old associate Archer shows up with an irresistible offer. If Dani takes on a job as a security consultant for the auction of deceased billionaire William Hackworth’s collection AND steals a particular painting, he’ll reunite her with her mother. Maria Poissant hasn’t spoken to Dani since she betrayed her and Dani wants nothing more than to patch up their relationship. 

She takes the job and sets off on the arduous task of scoping out one of the biggest and most secure private art collections in the world. She’s surprised to find Hackworth’s heir is a kind, handsome fellow who seems interested in her, so the fact she’s planning to steal from him does cause a small sense of guilt. Dani also has to get her mother’s old crew back together even though they haven’t spoken to her since the betrayal AND she was kind of in love with Elliott, one of the gang. You see where this is going – love triangle.

This sounds like a really cool story, right? That’s exactly why I requested it because romance + heist sounds like an unbeatable combination, but you would be wrong. This could have been a standard, non-magical heist novel and it would have worked just fine. The addition of the magic was an unnecessary element and I say that as a lifelong fan of the fantastical. It felt smooshed in, like the magic was an afterthought to what was originally planned as a standard thriller. I do admit, the demon soul painting was a cool idea but it wasn’t revealed until near the end of the book. And did I mention that the love interests are so bland they may as well be white bread? Elliott and Brad Hackworth have absolutely nothing going for them in terms of characterization and I really couldn’t have cared less about them or the romance aspect of the book.

Overall, this book just wasn’t really to my taste. I nearly DNF’d it around the halfway point, but decided to push on through to the end because something interesting happened and I wanted to see how things turned out. Unfortunately, I expected to like this far more than I did. I was also really annoyed by the fact that Dani was abandoned for years by people who were supposed to be almost family to her and her first thought is to forgive and accept them back into her life. And she even let her awful mother escape scot free at the end!