Lara Tupper

"[Tupper's novel is a] study of love relationships: How fulfilling and how devastating they can be, but how central they are to our human experience.

OFF ISLAND. Read it. Love it."

Boothbay Register

"A terrific book...an imagined historical fiction, perfect for summer."

Book review, OFF ISLAND

Novel talk: Lara Tupper in Conversation with Christina Baker Kline

By Lisa Kristoff

"Tupper sounds like someone I'd love to share a cup of tea with." - Tracey Barnes Priestley

This may be my favorite blurb ever.

RECOMMENDATION from The Second Half Online

Thanks to Elizabeth Rynecki and Authors Answer for this interview-- such inventive questions about my favorite works of art, an exhibition I'd like to see (The Shleppers: A Retrospective) and what brings me joy.

FULL INTERVIEW

"Lara Tupper's prose shines with the same vibrancy of color that captivated her protagonist [Paul Gauguin]....An elegant investigation of family and art as conflicting forces...an awe-inspiring portrait that readers will be reluctant to leave." Sara McCrea

FULL REVIEW: You Just Have to Read This

"Lara talked with Rose City Reader about her new book, the authority of a narrator's voice, and Zooming her latest book reading."

FULL INTERVIEW: Rose City Reader

"Dense with beautiful coastal imagery and thoughtful in its consideration of ill-suited connections, the novel picks at the seams of marriages and affairs with clarity. Though Gauguin's legacy is dark, Off Island, with its moody setting and vulnerable characters, is a novel to savor."

FULL REVIEW by Karen Rigby

Q: Did you travel to gather research for your novel, Off Island?

A: I visited Monhegan Island many times. It's an incredible place—a ninety-minute boat ride from my hometown. Miles of rugged hiking trails. No cars from the mainland. There was no cell service, until recently. It still feels like another time. If I could live there and write for an entire summer, I would.

The island light is ideal for painters, who line up on the hiking trails and cliff edges with their easels in the warmer months. I'm not a painter, but I'm fascinated by the process. I love to watch visual artists at work. It's a great mystery to me.

 FULL INTERVIEW: Nowhere Magazine

Q: How did you come up with the idea for Off Island, and why did you include the artist Paul Gauguin as an important part of the novel?

A: The idea occurred to me at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the summer of 2002. I wandered into a Paul Gauguin exhibit and was struck by his letters on display.

Gauguin wrote from Tahiti to his wife, Mette Gad, who was back in Denmark with their five children. He described his affairs with young Tahitian girls in great detail and I thought, There's another story here, from Mette's perspective. I didn't want her to be a victim. So I imagined a different story. Off Island includes various points of view; Mette's is one of them.

FULL INTERVIEW: Deborah Kalb Books