Guardians of the Louvre

The main character's DOOFUS FACE completely ruined it for me, I took three separate shifts to read it to temper my anger about him invading the entirety of the book! He picks "The Winged Victory of Samothrace" but skips the wings and adds the missing head which sports an Eastern-style Princess Leia hairdo which looks like the stereotyped cartoony Queen hat. Then, drastically different from the very revealing robe attire, he gives her a chin-to-floor pseudo-Elizabethan outfit with a frilly and multi-teared collar. There is only one fact about the statue, mentioned in passing, even though she is a major character. Ill blow out the rest of my anger by mentioning that the "magic-sauce" (my term) he uses every time reality gets weird is huge clumps of the fever-laden main character's phlegm! He is the best city-scape artist I ever remember seeing and his landscapes are only a personally subjective notch below because of the variance of subject matter. The flawless rendering of every architectural detail with the depth and light seen with your eyes! HIS NATURE IS BRILLIANT but I don't have so many singular row-houses to examine among all the buildings of varying heights that all create a sea of waves just like he referenced Van Gogh saying about the wheat fields. HIS INTERIORS ARE JAW-DROPPING too, allowing my eyes to scan every nook and curve of ceilings and the splendid arrays of the walls! SO WHY DO WE HAVE TO HAVE HIS FACE BLOCKING IT ON EVERY PAGE! He obviously has an uncanny respect for pure setting, so why does he betray it with the constant "Look at my pensive/surprised/etc." face? -StrictlySequential (goodreads)