Painter Of Silence Georgina Harding by Georgina Harding 9781620402436, 1620402432, B008AW5M9Y instant download after payment.

Georgina Harding’s kaleidoscopic new novel will appeal to readers of Anne Michaels, Michael Ondaatje, and Sándor Márai. Beautiful, spare, and intense, it captures the loss and the hope of a tragic time through the extraordinary vision of a mute outsider.

"Harding effortlessly alternates between pre- and post-WWII, and her expert pacing lends a moving solemnity to the proceedings."  -   Publishers Weekly

It is the early 1950s. A nameless man is found on the steps of the hospital in Iasi, Romania. He is deaf and mute, but a young nurse named Safta recognizes him from the past and brings him paper and pencils so that he might draw. Gradually, memories appear on the page: The man is Augustin, son of the cook at the manor house that was Safta’s family home. Born six months apart, they had grown up with a connection that bypassed words, but while Augustin’s world stayed the same size, Safta’s expanded to embrace languages, society, and a fleeting love one long, hot summer. But then came war, and in its wake, a brutal Stalinist regime, and nothing would remain the same. 

"A double portrait, executed in clean lines and strong light, of a daughter of the manor, a mute servant boy and the destruction of their settled life in rural Romania by World War II... Harding has created a memorable portrait in words of an exile from language."  -   Kirkus Reviews