A Piece of the World
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
‘Graceful, moving and powerful . . . a wonderful story that seems to have been waiting, all this time, for Kline to come along and tell it’ MICHAEL CHABON
For decades, Christina Olson’s whole world has been a rocky, windswept point on the coast of Maine, the farmhouse her ancestors fled to from the Salem witch trials. A world she fears she will never leave.
As a girl, farm life asked more of Christina than it did her family, her wasting limbs turning every task into a challenge. But the very tenacity that strengthened her may dash her chances for a life beyond her chores and extinguish her hopes for love.
Years pass and Christina’s solitude is broken by the arrival of Andrew Wyeth, a young artist who is fixated on the isolated farm house. In Christina he will discover more than a kindred spirit; for him, she will become a muse like no other…
From the bestselling author of ORPHAN TRAIN comes a luminous portrait of a woman of grit and grace, as heartwarming as it is gripping. A story that allows the reader to marvel at Andrew Wyeth’s iconic portrait from the other side.
Reviews
‘A moving portrait of a woman in search of autonomy and purpose in her life’ SUNDAY TIMES CULTURE
‘A graceful, moving and powerful demonstration of what can happen when a fearless literary imagination combines with an inexhaustible curiosity about the past and the human heart: a feat of time travel, a bravura improvisation on the theme of art history, a wonderful story that seems to have been waiting, all this time, for Christina Baker Kline to come along and tell it’ MICHAEL CHABON
‘Christina Baker Kline writes about home and place with wisdom and tenderness, but most of all she writes about Christina Olson with compassion, empathy and resounding admiration. This is an inspiring, haunting, powerful novel’ HELEN SEDGWICK, author of The Comet Seekers
‘An affecting and memorable novel… unexpected and bleakly beautiful world. I thought it explored the nature of art and inspiration in a fascinating way, whilst also posing profound questions about what endures and what proves transitory; about the roles we choose and those which are forced upon us’ MATTHEW PLAMPIN, author of Will & Tom
‘With remarkable precision and compassion, A PIECE OF THE WORLD transports us to a mid-century farmhouse on the coast of Maine. But just like the painting that inspired it, this novel is about so much more. It’s about the terrors and injustices of childhood, the aches of adulthood, the regrets of middle age. It’s a story about a woman trapped by family and duty and her own ailing body . . . Christina Baker Kline has accomplished something grand’ NATHAN HILL, author of The Nix
‘Tender, tragic, A PIECE OF THE WORLD is a fascinating exploration of the life lived inside that house at the top of the hill’ LILY KING
‘Painterly, sensuous, and sympathetic’ KIRKUS REVIEWS
‘A pure, powerful story of suffering met with a fight’ O Magazine (The Oprah Magazine)
‘Insightful, evocative prose brings Christina’s singular perspective and indomitable spirit to life’ PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
About the author
Christina Baker Kline is the author of five novels, including the #1 New York Times bestseller Orphan Train. Her other novels include Bird in Hand, The Way Life Should Be, Desire Lines, and Sweet Water
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Orphan Train author Christina Baker Kline recreates another moment in the life of America, drawing on the characters, landscape, and inspiration behind the artist Andrew Wyeth’s famous painting Christina’s World. Blending history and imagination, the story unfolds against the earth-and-sky backdrops of rural Maine. While Christina Olson isn't the easiest character to warm to, she emerges from this book as a deep, multifaceted person whose poignant struggles stay with us long after the final page has been turned.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The world of the woman immortalized in Andrew Wyeth's haunting painting Christina's World is imagined in Kline's (Orphan Train) intriguing novel. The artist meets Christina Olson in 1939 when he summers near her home in Cushing, Maine, introduced by Betsy James, the young woman who knew the Olsons and would become Wyeth's wife. The story is told from Christina's point of view, from the moment she reflects on the painting; it then goes back and forth through her history, from her childhood through the time that Wyeth painted at her family farm, using its environs and Christina and her brother as subjects. First encountering Christina as a middle-aged woman, Wyeth saw something in her that others did not. Their shared bond of physical infirmity (she had undiagnosed polio; he had a damaged right foot and bad hip) enables her to open up about her family and her difficult life, primarily as a shut-in, caring for her family, cooking, cleaning, sewing, and doing laundry all without electricity and despite her debilitating disease. Hope of escape, when her teacher offers her the chance to take her place, was summarily quashed by her father. Her first and only romance with a summer visitor from Boston has an ignoble end when he marries someone in his social class. Through it all, the author's insightful, evocative prose brings Christina's singular perspective and indomitable spirit to life.
