These Good Hands

Captive to a staggering genius and mounting paranoia, Mademoiselle—the fictional incarnation of legendary French sculptor Camille Claudel—relives her art-making in Belle Époque Paris from the asylum where she's been captive for thirty years. The year is 1943, the height of the Vichy regime in war-torn France, and salvation comes in the form of Solange Poitier, the nurse who cares for Mademoiselle in her final days, and their growing friendship. In this compassionate, deftly-researched novel...