In the late 19th century, an English missionary arrives on a remote island in the Indian Ocean, intent on wiping out fornication among the natives. Instead he incurs a curse that strikes first his dark-skinned wife, then his son and grandson. But is the curse supernatural—or a white man's guilty fascination with an alien new world?
“A hypnotic, cryptic, haunting exploration of the power of memory.” —The Boston Globe
JULIA BLACKBURN is the author of several books of nonfiction, including Old Man Goya, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and With Billie, which won the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award; and of the novels The Book of Color and The Leper’s Companions, both of which were short-listed for the Orange Prize. She lives in England.
View titles by Julia Blackburn
In the late 19th century, an English missionary arrives on a remote island in the Indian Ocean, intent on wiping out fornication among the natives. Instead he incurs a curse that strikes first his dark-skinned wife, then his son and grandson. But is the curse supernatural—or a white man's guilty fascination with an alien new world?
“A hypnotic, cryptic, haunting exploration of the power of memory.” —The Boston Globe
JULIA BLACKBURN is the author of several books of nonfiction, including Old Man Goya, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and With Billie, which won the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award; and of the novels The Book of Color and The Leper’s Companions, both of which were short-listed for the Orange Prize. She lives in England.
View titles by Julia Blackburn
