The Underpainter — Jane Urquhart

Austin Fraser's painting teacher had indoctrinated him with the view that unless something could be turned into art, it simply was not worth his time. And in this he included people. Austin certainly applied the principle to Sara Pengelly, who lived alone on the northern edge of Lake Superior, and whom Austin travelled north to visit for fifteen summers. During his annual visits Austin scrutinised Sara's every nuance of face and body with a bloodless and voracious intimacy - accumulating and hoarding her image for the paintings he executed in his New York studio during the rest of the year. He was her lover but he never dreamt of loving her. Art did not demand it. THE UNDERPAINTER is a breathtaking novel that examines art as exploitation, whilst interweaving captivating narrative threads of First World War drama; a world of war the purist Austin snobbishly despised until his friend in the field was himself shattered.