The True Story Behind the Novel

It is historical fiction inspired by a true story. The theft of Willem de Kooning’s Woman-Ochre in 1985 and the painting’s discovery in 2017 are real. The novel’s characters, conversations and private life are imagined. The book’s Author’s Note separates the public record from the story.

On November 29, 1985, a woman and a younger man walked into the University of Arizona Museum of Art in Tucson as it opened. While she distracted the guard, he went upstairs and cut the painting from its frame. In August 2017 it was found in the home of Jerry and Rita Alter in Cliff, New Mexico, after both had died. See the timeline above for the full story.

A married couple, both former schoolteachers, who traveled widely and retired to a quiet home in Cliff, New Mexico, near Silver City. Jerry died in 2012 and Rita in 2017. The painting was found in their bedroom when the contents of their house were sold.

No one has ever been charged, and the FBI has not said who stole it. Circumstantial evidence has pointed to the Alters, including a family photo of the couple in Tucson at Thanksgiving dinner the day before the theft, but the case is officially unsolved.

No. The painting came home, but the question of who took it, and how it ended up behind a bedroom door, has never been officially answered.

In 2015 the museum estimated its value at as much as $160 million. Many news reports have described it as a $100 million painting.

Back where it started. After a restoration at the Getty Conservation Institute and an exhibition at the Getty in Los Angeles in the summer of 2022, it returned to the University of Arizona Museum of Art in Tucson in October 2022.

No. Jerry and Rita in the novel are invented characters, not portraits of real people. The novel imagines what a marriage like theirs might have been, without claiming to know.

No, and it does not try to. Most coverage of the case asked how. The novel asks a different question: what it would be like to share a secret with one other person for a lifetime. In the author’s words, “So I did not write the theft. I wrote the marriage.”

Rita does. She tells it from her final days, as an illness threatens the memories that have kept the secret safe.

Yes. The Thief Collector (2022), directed by Allison Otto, examines the theft and the Alters. You can watch several documentaries about the case on our In the News page.

In Our Secret Life goes on sale October 27, 2026, in hardcover ($34.99) and ebook ($9.99). The trade paperback ($18.99) follows on June 1, 2027.

Yes. The novel includes a reading group guide, and you can find the discussion questions, a letter from the author and a free video visit for your club on the Book Clubs page.

An El Paso entrepreneur, publisher and editor, twice recognized by the U.S. Small Business Administration. In Our Secret Life is his first novel. Read more about the author.