The Last Van Gogh

by Alyson Richman

Overview

Summer, 1890. Van Gogh arrives at Auvers-sur-Oise, a bucolic French village that lures city artists to the country. It is here that twenty-year-old Maurguerite Gachet has grown up, attending to her father and brother ever since her mother's death. And it is here that Vincent Van Gogh will spend his last summer, under the care of Doctor Gachet - homeopathic doctor, dilettante painter, and collector. In these last days of his life, Van Gogh will create over 70 paintings, two of them portraits of Marguerite Gachet. But little does he know that, while capturing Marguerite and her garden on canvas, he will also capture her heart.

Both a love story and historical novel, The Last Van Gogh recreates the final months of Vincent's life - and the tragic relationship between a young girl brimming with hope and an artist teetering on despair.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780425212677
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	10/03/2006
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	525,830
Product dimensions:	5.38(w) x 8.24(h) x 0.83(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Alyson Richman is the international bestselling author of The Velvet Hours, The Garden of Letters, The Lost Wife, The Last Van Gogh, The Rhythm of Memory, and The Mask Carver’s Son. She lives in Long Island, New York, with her husband and two children.

Editorial Reviews

Richman (The Mask Carver's Son; Swedish Tango) speculates in her third novel that Vincent Van Gogh found his muse in the 21-year-old daughter of his last doctor. Marguerite Gachet, accustomed to her father's revolving door of artist patients (Cezanne, Pissarro, Bernard among them), finds herself enamored of the disheveled Van Gogh ("a rare blend of vulnerability and bravado") shortly after his arrival at her father's home in Auvers, where Van Gogh undergoes treatment for his manifold illnesses. Though Marguerite is little more than a servant to her father, a failed painter turned physician who prides himself to an absurd extent on his art collection, she manages, with the help of her cloistered half-sister, to begin a covert flirtation with Van Gogh. Between sitting-thrice-for Van Gogh and carrying on her household duties, Marguerite uncovers a family secret and has a clandestine rendezvous with the painter. Though Marguerite's frustrated love is carefully rendered, other characters are mostly memorable for their quirks (her father, the failed painter; her brother, the goofy sycophant; her half-sister, the gold-hearted sage). The climax may be a bit breathless, but, then again, Van Gogh isn't remembered for his subtlety. (Oct.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Vincent van Gogh spent the last two months of his life in 1890 in Auvers-sur-Oise, under the care of Doctor Gachet, a homeopath and aspiring artist. Richman (Swedish Tango) portrays that time from the perspective of Gachet's 20-year-old daughter, Marguerite, the subject of two of Van Gogh's paintings. Rigidly obedient to her widowed father, Marguerite seems little more than a servant to him, her brother, and two women who remain hidden from society, Madame Chevalier and Louise-Josephine. With Louise-Josephine's encouragement and help, Marguerite arranges clandestine encounters with the artist. After posing for his last painting, she spends the rest of her life under the domination of her father and her cruel and jealous brother. The characters of Gachet's household are strange and unlikable; one wishes Van Gogh could flee to Paris to escape. Marguerite's repression seems so extreme that she likely would have pursued any eligible male visitor allowed to interact with her, and although Van Gogh responds with passion, he remains focused on his work. Libraries with large fiction collections may want a copy, but they should also have materials about Van Gogh's life and art for those wanting to know more. Kathy Piehl, Minnesota State Univ. Lib., Mankato Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

Another in the ever-expanding genre of possible romances between famous painters and their subjects. The real-life van Gogh spent the last 70 days of his life, an artistically prolific period, in Auvers-sur-Oise under the care of Dr. Gachet, a homeopathic physician. Richman (Swedish Tango, 2004, etc.) re-envisions those weeks in 1890 by focusing on the doctor's daughter, Marguerite. Approaching 21, she has spent her childhood isolated with her younger brother, who is cared for by Madame Chevalier, a "governess" who is clearly their father's mistress. Madame's daughter, Louise-Josephine (probably Marguerite's half-sister), has recently joined the eccentric household. A would-be painter with a growing art collection, Dr. Gachet does not allow mixing with the townspeople. Marguerite, a gifted pianist and gardener who yearns for experience in the world, is immediately attracted to van Gogh, who seems serious and physically fragile but relatively sane. Smitten himself, he asks Dr. Gachet's permission to paint Marguerite. He portrays her first in the garden, capturing her loneliness, then at the piano, showing her beauty. As their flirtation deepens, Marguerite also begins to forge a genuine friendship with Louise-Josephine, who regularly sneaks out to meet her local sweetheart. Soon, Marguerite is doing the same to meet Vincent. But a visit to his brother in Paris leaves van Gogh distraught. He explains that given his limited energy and funds, he cannot afford to marry, but he gives Marguerite a third portrait, hidden in their private cave: "It will always be here for you," he promises. Dr. Gachet catches her returning and sequesters her at home. Days later, van Gogh shoots himself.When Louise-Josephine, the story's only truly healthy character, marries and suggests that Marguerite come to Paris, Marguerite chooses to remain in Auvers-sur-Oise, to be near Vincent's painting. Despite Richman's talent with visual detail, nothing new about van Gogh is illuminated, and wan Marguerite never comes fully to life.

Kirkus Reviews