"Wieland tells the intricately woven story of three women whose lives intersect over time in ways only gradually revealed. . . . Wieland engages the reader in the emotional lives of each of these unique women, weaving their stories together during and after 9/11 to create a compelling story of the undeniable power of the muse."—Booklist
"Wieland is a vital voice in contemporary American fiction. Her prose is crisp, her voices are true, and her acuity is remarkable."—Colum McCann, author of the National Book Award-winning Let the Great World Spin
"Land of Enchantment is a beautifully written, dizzyingly knowledgeable examination of the intersection between art and life. It is the best novel I’ve read in the past year.”"—Charles Frazier, winner of the National Book Award for Cold Mountain
"In the beautifully entangled Land of Enchantment, events unfold on the surface but the novel’s nutrients lie below, in the powerful pulse of art that runs through, and in the connections and disconnections between the characters."—Raleigh News and Observerer
Description
New Mexico, 1985. Brigid Long Night, a young half-Navajo painter, goes to work as an assistant for the elderly Georgia O’Keeffe. Haunted by the decision to give up her newborn daughter for adoption, Brigid struggles with the direction and inertia of her life. With O’Keeffe’s encouragement, Brigid develops a powerful style, incorporating language and wordplay as well as image in her portrayal of Native American life and her place in it.
Atlanta, 1995. Nancy Diamond, an aspiring playwright, encounters Brigid’s work and begins to understand the hidden truths about her own life as the child born of an affair between her white mother and an African American artist. New York City, 2001. Sasha Hernandez enrolls at Columbia University to study filmmaking. She has only recently discovered that her mother, living in Manhattan, is a celebrated painter and sculptor whose work is installed in the
sculpture garden at the World Trade Center.
In Liza Wieland’s deeply moving novel, these interwoven stories show how art reveals the depth and complexity of human love, in all its betrayals and losses, beauty and redemption.
About the Author
Liza Wieland is the author of three novels, three collections of short fiction, and a volume of poems. Her work has been awarded two Pushcart Prizes, a National Endowment of the Arts grant, and the Michigan Literary Fiction Award. She teaches at East Carolina University and lives near Oriental, NC, with her husband and daughter.
6 x 9, 296 pages, 1 color illustrations
March 2015
