European Book Club - December

The European Book Club at the Alliance Française de Denver meets on the last Tuesday of each month to discuss books by a diverse list of European authors. Each month the group will read a work by a different European author that has been translated into English. This group is led by dedicated member and volunteer, Nan Campbell.   

This Month's Selection: 

"The Painter of Birds" by Lidia Jorge (Portugal)

Summary:

The story of a daughter's longing for her absent father and her determination to piece together the past and the future. The setting of this extraordinary novel is an old farmhouse in Portugal-a house far enough from the Atlantic not to hear the breaking waves during a storm but near enough for the walls to be corroded by the salt in the air. With most members of her large family having left the hardship of life in this landscape of sand and stone for jobs in faraway places, a young woman struggles to piece together her past from the widely varying stories she's been told. Left behind by a free-spirited, feckless father, a seducer with a rare gift for drawing, she is raised by her uncle who has married her mother. The only memories of her father's two brief visits are the echoes of his footsteps on the stairs leading to her room. The only signs of him are letters from the widest reaches of the world-letters accompanied by brilliantly colored drawings of exotic birds. The daughter longs for her father and, as she grows up, she is determined to find him and uncover the truth. Brimming with astute and exquisite characterizations, this strikingly lyrical novel evokes the atmosphere of rural Portugal in a changing world and explores the timeless themes of family, independence, and the often painful experience of emigration. --goodreads.com

Author's Bio:

Lídia Jorge (born 18 June 1946) is a prominent Portuguese novelist and author whose work is representative of a recent style of Portuguese writing, the so-called "Post Revolution Generation". Her books have won international recognition and have been published in many countries. --Wikipedia