The Last Summer of the World: A Novel

by Emily Mitchell

Overview

"Absorbing…Mitchell's novel [is] the real thing." —Boston Globe

In the summer of 1918, with the Germans threatening Paris, Edward Steichen arrives in France to photograph the war for the American army. There, he finds a country filled with poignant memories for him: early artistic success, marriage, the birth of two daughters, and a love affair that divided his family. Told with elegance and transporting historical sensitivity, Emily Mitchell’s first novel captures the life of a great American artist caught in the reckoning of a painful past in a world beset by war.

A Finalist for the New York Public Library's Young Lion's Fiction Award and named a Best Book of the Year by the Providence Journal, the Austin-American-Stateman, and the Madison Capital Times.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393331943
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	07/17/2008
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	400
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.20(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Emily Mitchell's stories have been published in Harper’s, Ploughshares, New England Review, and elsewhere. She teaches at the University of Maryland. Her novel The Last Summer of the World was published in 2007. She lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Editorial Reviews

"Her story, written with grace and precision, doesn’t want for scope, and Ms. Mitchell’s shrewd restraint lends her work a concentrated power."

New York Sun

"In this debut novel, the life of a celebrated artist is imagined with the sensibility of a seasoned author…With a plot relentless in its inevitability, and the language shifting from spare to lush, Mitchell’s voice is refined and graceful depicting what is not: war and the dissolution of a marriage."

Providence Journal

"Finely wrought…rich in detail…Mitchell has a lyrical sensibility and a glorious ability to write about art."

Madison Capital Times

"Beautifully rendered."

Salon

"Mitchell vividly imagines the terror of these historic dogfights…Enriching her intensely psychological tale with cameos of Auguste Rodin and others. Mitchell evokes the spell of creativity and the pain of rupture when following one’s vision severely complicates relationships."

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