Old Masters in Marrakesh

Max Marwell is caught between running his global art business and dealing with his own past and that of the Jewish people. Born and raised in Linz, Austria, the hometown of Hitler and Eichmann, he is obsessed with avenging the deaths of his parents and the restitution of art looted by the Nazis. Masterpieces are traced, bought, and transported to Casablanca and Marrakesh, as Max is pursued through North Africa and France. His adventures entangle him with a murder case, hunted by French police and Interpol. The novel offers a peek into the art world and the way it sometimes overlaps with less salubrious circles.

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Set in Morocco and Britain at the end of 1969, the year of UK decimalisation and the Moon Landing, the novel examines how people who are inclusive and forward-looking thrive at these moments of change. At the time, Marrakesh was a meeting point for visionaries like Yves Saint Laurent and romantics looking for a continuation of the summer of love. Internationally renowned art dealer Max Marwell wishes for his son to take over his Mayfair art gallery, but the younger Marwell is an addict. Max is shipping art but also pure heroin within the crated masterpieces; this is so his son does not die from a bad dose. As the world winds into the 1970s, and as Max finds new love and breaks away from vengeance, the world of the Marwells changes drastically.

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Endorsements

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“Thick with the heat of Morocco and the colours of the past, this is a whirlwind trip into the darker side of the art world of the twentieth century.”

—Rachael Blok, author of the DCI Jansen series of detective novels

 

 

“Old Masters in Marrakesh is funny and clever; it ticks along like an intricately crafted machine, yet time and again James Debens led me astray with his ingenious sleights of hand. It builds to an ending of real emotional heft.”

—Ben McPherson, author of The Island

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Cover image: © Goran Baba Ali

A modified photo taken in Marrakesh

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