“I’ve been a journalist for more than 20 years, but there was one pivotal moment that changed the course of my career. When I was 26, I was assigned to cover the “Degenerate Art” exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago. The exhibit literally stopped me in my tracks, and later became the basis for my first novel, “Fugitive Colors.” Even as the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, I had never known about the Nazis’ relentless mission to destroy anything avant-garde, particularly painters and their work …