A single day in Amsterdam, 1632. The Surgeons’ Guild has commissioned a young artist named Rembrandt to paint Dr. Nicolaes Tulp as he performs a medical dissection. In the swirl of anticipation and intrigue surrounding the event, we meet an extraordinary constellation of men and women whose lives hinge, in some way, on Dr. Tulp’s anatomy lesson. There is Aris the Kid, the condemned coat thief whose body is to be used for the dissection; Flora, his pregnant lover; Jan Fetchet, the curio dealer who acquires corpses for the doctor’s work; the great René Descartes, who will attend the dissection in his quest to understand where the human soul resides; and the Dutch master himself, who feels a shade uneasy about this assignment.        As the story builds to its dramatic conclusion, circumstances conspire to produce a famous painting—and an immortal painter. Vividly rendered, masterfully written, The Anatomy Lesson is a story of mind and body, death and love—and redemptive power of art. “A literary page-turner that captures a story behind a masterpiece. . . . [An] intricate work of historical fiction.” — Oprah .com “Fascinating. . . . Conveys the pomp, graft, bustle and rough justice of 17th-century Holland through a multitude of voices.” — The New York Times Book Review “Siegal succeeds in the task she has set herself—to transmute her material into a work of art.” — The New Yorker   “Nina Siegal’s lovely novel dissects the dissection, evocatively translating the painted narrative into words.” —Russell Shorto, author of Amsterdam “Brilliantly structured. . . . Filled with vivid characters. . . . Dazzling.” —Margot Livesey, author of The Flight of Gemma Hardy “Once in a rare while, you get to read a story of such breathtaking beauty and intelligence that you remember why you love to read.  The Anatomy Lesson  is just such a novel. In stunning prose, Nina Siegal animates Rembrandt’s first masterpiece, spinning a deeply affecting tale of love, loss and redemption as she reveals the secrets of the human soul. It is a gorgeous literary page turner of immense sympathy and elegance, equal in artistic élan to its inspiration. Brava!” —Robin Oliveira, author of My Name is Mary Sutter “A thought-provoking and richly populated novel by a talented new voice.” — Shelf Awareness “Virtually every sentence is drenched in the atmosphere of 17th-century Amsterdam. We feel as if we are walking at Rembrandt’s side, in a cell awaiting the execution of a thief, rushing through the streets with the condemned’s lover in hopes of saving him. This is a novel to be absorbed for its rich evocation of a single day when one man died and another rose to fame for his art.” — Historical Novel Society “Splendid. . . . Through masterful use of subtle details, embroidered into beautiful writing, Siegal suggests that art and violence often intertwine.” — Publishers Weekly Nina Siegal received her MFA in fiction from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and her BA from Cornell. She is the author of two novels, A Little Trouble With the Facts and The Anatomy Lesson , and is the recipient of many fellowships, grants, and awards, including the Jack Leggett Fellowship from Iowa, a Fulbright Fellowship in Creative Writing, and MacDowell Colony Fellowships. She has covered fine art and culture for  The New York Times ,  Bloomberg News , the International Herald Tribune ,  W ,  Art in America , and many other publications. I Hanging Day THE BODY At the first toll of the Westerkerk bell Adriaen Adriaenszoon bolts awake in a dank stone jail inside Amsterdam’s town hall. He is shivering and sweating at the same time. Shivering because winter gnaws through his meager leather jerkin, sweating because of the nightmare out of which he’s just awakened. What he remembers is no more than an assemblage of symbols—­a dog, a wall made of doors, an old woman with a pail full of sand—­but fear is pounding through him insistently, demanding he return to sleep to see out the dream. There is the promise of solace through one of those doors, and a bed to lie on, something tells him. But his eyes will not close again. His other senses are already registering the day. Horse’s hooves tromp in the puddles somewhere nearby. There’s a whinny and the sound of clacking steel on cobblestones. The street, which he can see only through the tiny window, is glistening from last night’s downpour. The air smells of mineral soil, sweat, and piss. He crosses himself before remembering where he is, then glances around nervously in hopes that no guards have seen this. He presses his callused palm through his coarse hair and slumps against the cold wall. There’s only his cell mate, Joep van de Gheyn, the fishmonger killer, still asleep on the plank against his own wall. Aris wipes his sweat from his brow with his left hand, then rubs the stump over its bloody bandages, stifling the throbbing of the limb, which pulses with every heartbeat. “That’s all right now. E