I'll ask for a show of hands: How many of you have a painting hanging in your home that you hope will fund your retirement? Are there any of you who are sick of looking at the ceramic duck on the mantle but are hesitant to get rid of it because Grandma always said it would be worth money one day? On both sides of the Atlantic, the appraisers on the popular television program "Antiques Roadshow" encounter hundreds of people who wait in line for hours, each with the hope that hiding under their landscape oil painting of a beautiful mountain sunset lies a heretofore undiscovered Rembrandt.

Most of the time, they're wrong, but expert Philip Mould, who appears regularly on the BBC version of the show, delights when they're right. Mould is in the business of distinguishing a Rembrandt from a Sunday painter, and in his newest book, "The Art Detective: Fakes, Frauds and Finds and the Search for Lost Treasures," he shares the stories behind some of his most exciting discoveries.

Mould is brought on a new adventure with each new chapter. He braves the back roads of Vermont in the middle of winter as he winds his way to a breathtaking treasure in an abandoned church; he wrings his hands at a dinner party, distracted by an auction taking place half a planet away, where he is about to spend the most money he's ever spent on a portrait; he travels to the small town where Norman Rockwell created his masterpieces, to uncover the truth about a forgery born of desperation.

Mould does an excellent job of bringing the reader into the high-end circles of the art world as we learn about the intricacies of restoration, the importance of provenance and the nerve-racking pressure of buying at auction.

While Mould's gallery walls may be heavy with paintings worth millions of dollars in London -- in addition to a successful gallery and television career, he is also the art adviser to the British House of Commons and House of Lords -- his stories remind us that the world's masterpieces have been, and will continue to be, uncovered in the most unlikely of places.

So, sometimes a ceramic duck is just a ceramic duck.

Star Tribune, Star Tribune
Holding an empty picture frame, Phillip Mould stands in his gallery in London, September 2, 1999. Behind him are paintings "Maj. Gen Horton Briscoe, The Meritorious Officer" painted by Tilly Kettle in the 17th century and Queen Henrietta Maria painted by the circle of Sir Anthony Van Dyck in the 17th century. In the past 15 years, Mould has rescued from obscurity five Van Dycks, "three or four" Gainsboroughs, a rare painting of King Henry VIII's oldest brother and a portrait by George Romney that an unfortunate American dealer dismissed as a copy.

But sometimes, if you're lucky, Grandma was right.

Kim Schmidt is a writer living in Illinois.