“Woman on the Staircase,” a new book by Bernhard Schlink, author of the famous “Reader,” topped the Der Spiegel magazine bestseller list immediately after its publication, and its translation rights were sold to at least a dozen countries. This is a novel about love with an almost detective intrigue around a painting that disappeared for forty years and suddenly reappeared. The amazing story is connected with the intricate relationships in the love quadrangle, which is made up of the woman depicted in the painting and three men - a large businessman (the customer of the painting), a world-famous artist and a successful young lawyer who is invited to resolve the conflict between the customer and the artist, but he himself becomes the protagonist of the conflict and at the same time a story teller. As for the painting, one cannot help but notice its similarity with Gerhard Richter’s painting “Ema. Nude on a Staircase" is a famous work by perhaps the most expensive living artist, who is not without reason nicknamed the Picasso of the 21st century.