nina schuyler

At the Opera House, 2009

At the Opera House, 2009

§

 

Cobwebbed curtains open at the opera house, and someone has built a bonfire on stage. Behind the fire is the orchestra. I sit in the balcony, trying to listen to the orchestra play Mozart’s Ein Musikalischer Spass. But everyone around me is throwing spitballs or calling each other on cell phones.

Nina Schuyler

Nina Schuyler’s novel, The Painting, published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, was named a Best Book by San Francisco Chronicle and nominated for the Northern California Book Award. It’s been translated into Chinese, Portuguese, and Serbian. Her short story, “Water Babies” won the Santa Clara Review’s Editor’s Choice Prize for Fiction, her short short, “Black Holes” won the Big Ugly Review Short Short Contest for 2008; and she was a finalist in the 2009 Stanford Fiction Contest.

Collision

Collision

§

 

The hospital room was the size of a birdcage. Only a flimsy curtain separated me from the Russian man. His dumpy wife was visiting again, her sagging face done up in bold paint, and atop her head, a pink pillbox hat. Sure enough, the room was filling with ugly clouds of Russian.

Nina Schuyler

Nina Schuyler’s novel, The Painting, published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, was named a Best Book by San Francisco Chronicle and nominated for the Northern California Book Award. It’s been translated into Chinese, Portuguese, and Serbian. Her short story, “Water Babies” won the Santa Clara Review’s Editor’s Choice Prize for Fiction, her short short, “Black Holes” won the Big Ugly Review Short Short Contest for 2008; and she was a finalist in the 2009 Stanford Fiction Contest.

The Painting

In 1869 Japan, a young woman escapes the confines of her arranged marriage by painting memories of her lover on mulberry paper. She secretly wraps the painting around a ceramic pot that's bound for Europe. In France, a disenchanted young man works as a clerk at an import shop. When he opens the box from Japan, he discovers the brilliant watercolor of two lovers locked in an embrace under a plum tree. He steals the painting and hides it in his room. With each viewing, he sees something different, and gradually the painting transforms him.

cover of The Paintingauthor: Nina Schuyler
ASIN or ISBN-10: 1565124413
binding: Hardcover
list price: $22.95 USD
amazon price: $8.00 USD


Syndicate content