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list price: $24.95
edition:Paperback
also available: eBook
category: Fiction
published: Sep 2020
ISBN:9781771088831
publisher: Nimbus Publishing
imprint: Vagrant Press

Brighten the Corner Where You Are

A Novel Inspired by the Life of Maud Lewis

by Carol Bruneau

tagged: literary, contemporary women, cultural heritage, biographical
Description

Brighten The Corner Where You Are has been Longlisted for 2022 Dublin Literary Awards, and was the winner of the 2021 Miramichi Reader's "The Very Best!" Book Awards.

A brilliant novel reimagining the life of internationally renowned folk artist Maud Lewis by an award-winning author.

But I had known since forever that it's colours that keep the world turning,
that keep a person going.

One glimpse of the tiny painted house that folk art legend Maud Lewis shared with her husband, Everett, in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, during the mid-twentieth century and the startling contrast between her joyful artwork and her life's deprivations is evident. One glimpse at her photo and you realize, for all her smile's shyness, she must've been one tough cookie. But, beneath her iconic resilience, who was Maud, really? How did she manage, holed up in that one-room house with no running water, married to a miserly man known for his drinking? Was she happy, or was she miserable? Did painting save or make her Everett's meal ticket? And then there are the darker secrets that haunt her story: the loss of her parents, her child, her first love.

Against all odds, Maud Lewis rose above these constraints—and this is where you'll find the Maud of Brighten the Corner Where You Are: speaking her mind from beyond the grave, freed of the stigmas of gender, poverty, and disability that marked her life and shaped her art. Unfettered and feisty as can be, she tells her story her way, illuminating the darkest corners of her life. In possession of a voice all her own, Maud demonstrates the agency that hovers within us all.

About the Author
Carol Bruneau is the award-winning author of nine books. Her reviews, essays, and articles have appeared across Canada, and she has previously taught courses on writing for the arts at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. She lives in Halifax, NS.
Contributor Notes

Carol Bruneau is the acclaimed author of three short story collections, including A Bird on Every Tree, published by Vagrant Press in 2017, and five other novels. Her first novel, Purple for Sky, won the 2001 Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award and the Dartmouth Book Award. Her 2007 novel, Glass Voices, was a Globe and Mail Best Book and has become a book club favourite. Her most recent novel, A Circle on the Surface, won the Jim Connors Dartmouth Book Award. Her reviews, stories, and essays have appeared nationwide in newspapers, journals, and anthologies, and two of her novels have been published internationally. She lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, with her husband and their dog and badass cat.

Editorial Review

This book is beautiful, as rich and uplifting as it is a literary masterpiece. —Kerry Claire of Picklemethis.com (Toronto, ON)

"In Bruneau's talented hands, the story becomes a fully realized narrative that doesn?t require knowledge of Lewis's work. In the manner of Alice Sebold's 2002 bestseller, The Lovely Bones, Bruneau has created a first-person structure in which her protagonist reflects on her past and on events in the world after her death.... The approach also allows the character to address her posthumous fame and misconceptions about her marriage. Lewis is presented as a woman of strength and sass, a chain-smoker who detested being seen as a victim (even when she clearly was), and who desired romance and simple pleasures. But perhaps most importantly, it is clear that Bruneau respects Lewis as an artist and a human. Brighten the Corner Where You Are is a welcome addition to the Lewis legacy."
Quill & Quire, starred review (September 2020)

"In Brighten the Corner, Maud gains a fulsomeness. She is not simply a vision of misery and a subject of pity nor a model of indefatigable spirit and artistic joy, but a cauldron of divergent emotions and thoughts... This is a fine book bringing credible depth to an artist who, for all that she contributed to Nova Scotia lore, is largely unknown.
The Miramichi Reader

"In Brighten the Corner Where You Are, Carol Bruneau imagines Maud Lewis narrating her own story, and in so doing she has created a literary response to Maud's painted legacy that adds much to our understanding of this much misunderstood artist.... [An] incisive, generous, and powerful reading of Maud Lewis's painted world." — Ray Cronin, Billie magazine

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