Archaeologist Vernon Silver had an inside look at one of the biggest scandals in the antiquities world: the Euphronias krater. With a story that should have rivaled every tomb raider pulp novel ever written, how could he lose? Well, how about making his book more arid than the noonday Sahara?It's true. With a story this interesting, featuring big names in the art world (the Met and Getty museums, just to name two), Silver managed to make this a story completely devoid of life and interest -- until the last two chapters. I can assure you that, by that point, I was finishing the book out of sheer stubbornness and not because of any tremendous interest that Silver had managed to provoke.That's unfortunate, coming as it does from an anthropology major who chose this book because of the importance of knowing how looted antiquities damage cultures by deleting their context.Only for the most serious of art historians, I'm sorry to say.(Review based on uncorrected proof.)
