A breathtaking exploration of art and the transformative power of love, this beautiful, evocative novel tells the story of two tortured souls united by pain and desire. It is a mesmerising historical novel of art and obsession - centered around the life of painter Oskar Kokoschka.
In the spring of 1918, the world - along with Oskar Kokoschka's heart - lies in ruins. Crippled in the Great War, broken by a failed love affair with his bedeviling muse Alma Mahler, the dispossessed artist arrives in Dresden where he is offered the solace of a patron's home and the ministrations of his servant girl, Hulda.
As the lonely Hulda tenderly nurses Oskar's broken body, her quiet manner and intuitive spirit rejuvenate his imagination. Shadowed by her own loss, Hulda falls under the artist's spell as well, both captured by his genius and tormented by his demons - erotic and haunting obsessions that could carry him beyond any hope, and precipitate the tragic downfall of them both.
