âA luminous novel.ââChristina Baker Kline, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author of Orphan Train, The Exiles, and A Piece of the World
âPure color!â wrote Paul Gauguin to his wife, Mette, from the South Seas. âEverything must be sacrificed to it.â
In Off Island, novelist Lara Tupper imagines Gauguinâchasing new light, new colorâran away to a new island, a rugged outpost off the coast of Maine. There, Gauguin leaves behind some paintings and letters, and maybe a child.
A hundred years later, another Maine painter, Pete, finds himself torn between his muses: the sturdy, reliable Molly, and the unhappy, peripatetic Karlaâwho promises to take him to other, newer islands.
Off Island captures the lure of the unknown and the pull of the familiar, and questions what it means to be loyal to oneâs art, oneâs family, and oneâs home.