“Victoria Redel masterfully evokes the rich period of Golden Age Amsterdam . . . It is spellbinding, wonderfully atmospheric, and impossible to forget” Sarah Jessica Parker, 2025 Booker Prize Judge

At eight years old, Gerta Pieters is forced to disguise herself as a boy and sent to work for a genteel family. When their brilliant and beautiful daughter Maria sees through Gerta’s ruse, she insists Gerta accompany her to Amsterdam and help her enter the elite, male-dominated art world.

While Maria rises in the ranks of society as a painting prodigy, Gerta makes herself invaluable in every way: confidante, muse, lover. But as Gerta steps into her own talents, their relationship fractures into a complex web of obsession and rivalry, until the secrets they keep threaten to unravel everything.

“A true stand out…With echoes of Yael van der Wouden’s The Safekeep, I Am You is earthy and fleshy and pulsates with suppressed emotions of rage, envy and desire. A wonder of a novel” Elizabeth Fremantle, bestselling author of Firebrand