John Wheatcroft’s new novel, The Portrait of a Lover, is now available from Inverted-A Press. It is listed on Amazon and can be purchased just in time for Christmas, with a mere click of a button.
The Portrait of a Lover is a book about love in its most exalted form. What makes it love? Is it the interaction between two people? Or is it how one person feels about another, despite all the obstacles? Do two people need to be conjoined for it to be love? Or is love a unilateral emotion?
In the above book trailer, the music of composer Jackson Hill is used to as a backdrop to the central issues present in John Wheatcroft’s book. The Portrait of a Lover is informed with a deep understanding of music, as the central character, Sarah Hevers is in love with a conductor who mistakenly overvalues her musical talent.
Besides the issue of love, there is a thread of commentary on art, from the visual to the auditory to the poetic mode. This is a book rich in culture and the exploration of meaning constructed by individuals lost in their own world. Sarah Hevers has an excellent ear, but not the best of voices. She has an eye for art, but she is not an artist. She finds solace in poetry, but she is not a poet.
She finds refuge from sorrow in self-abnegation, but is the self ever really submerged, when still alive to the power of art?
Someone on your list will probably enjoy reading The Portrait of a Lover. If you order the book today, it will ship in time for Christmas.
This sounds like a good book for people who love these titles. I will have to read it eventually. It sort of reminds me of the Age of Innocence, in the description.
Thanks, Sweetbearies. It is a literary novel and in that sense similar to Age of Innocence, but very different in other ways. Age of Innocence is a social commentary on the way individuals fall ensnared in society’s mores and about how people are manipulated by others to give up their only chance at happiness.
But The Portrait of a Lover is strangely asocial, even though it is not at all anti-social. Sarah manages to live within society without really being touched by it. She responds to art, but is oddly unaffected by people, with the exception of the man she loves.
It’s hard to describe the aloofness in the character, but it’s worth reading and pondering.