About this item
Sinuous and striking, heartbreaking and strange, Costalegre is heavily inspired by the real-life relationship between the heiress Peggy Guggenheim and her daughter, Pegeen. Acclaimed author Courtney Maum triumphs with this wildly imaginative and curiously touching story of a privileged teenager who has everything a girl could wish for except for a mother who loves her back. It is 1937, and Europe is on the brink of war. In the haute-bohemian circles of Austria, Germany, and Paris, Hitler is circulating a most-wanted list of "cultural degenerates" -- artists, writers, and thinkers whose work is deemed antithetical to the new regime. To prevent the destruction of her favorite art (and artists) , the impetuous American heiress and modern art collector, Leonora Calaway, begins chartering boats and planes for an elite group of surrealists to Costalegre, a mysterious resort in the Mexican jungle, where she has a home. The story of what happens to these artists when they reach their destination is told from the point of view of Lara, Leonora's neglected 15-year-old daughter, who has been pulled out of school to follow her mother to Mexico. Forced from a young age to cohabit with her mother's eccentric whims, tortured lovers, and entourage of gold-diggers, Lara suffers from emotional, educational, and geographical instability that a Mexican sojourn with surrealists isn't going to help. But when she meets the outcast Dadaist sculptor Jack Klinger, a much older man who has already been living in Costalegre for some time, Lara thinks she might have found the love and understanding she so badly craves.
About the Author
Courtney Maum is the author of the novels Costalegre (a GOOP book club pick and one of Glamour Magazine's top books of the decade) , I Am Having So Much Fun Here Without You and Touch (a New York Times Editor's Choice and NPR Best Book of the Year selection) , the popular guidebook Before and After the Book Deal: A writer's guide to finishing, publishing, promoting, and surviving your first book, and the forthcoming memoir, The Year of the Horses. Courtney's writing has been widely published in such outlets as the New York Times, and O, the Oprah Magazine, and her short story This is Not Your Fault was turned into an Audible Original at Amazon. Courtney is the founder of the collaborative retreat program, The Cabins and she has a creativity advice newsletter "Get Published, Stay Published" that you can sign up for at CourtneyMaum.com courtneymaum.comTwitter: cmaumNewsletter: MaumalogInstagram: cbmaumFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/courtneymaumbooks/
