Utopia

Heidi Sopinka

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Paperback

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English

Scribe Publications
30 August 2022

Fiction & Literature; Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945); Romance; Bargains

It's okay for men to make bad art. There's no price on their head for doing it ... Nothing for men is pre-determined, except their chance at great success.

Los Angeles, 1978.

When Romy, a gifted young artist in the male-dominated art scene of 1970s California, dies in suspicious circumstances, it is not long before her art-star husband Billy finds a replacement.

Paz, fresh out of art school in New York, returns to California to take her place. But she is haunted by Romy, who is everywhere- in the photos and notebooks and art strewn around the house, and in the eyes of the baby she left behind.

As Paz attempts to claim her creative life, strange things begin to happen. Photographs move, noises reverberate through the house, people start to question what really happened the night Romy died, and then a postcard in her handwriting arrives. As Paz becomes increasingly obsessed with the woman she has replaced, a disturbing picture begins to emerge, driving her deep into the desert - the site of Romy's final artwork - to uncover the truth.

At once an exquisite exploration of creativity and an atmospheric page-turner, Utopia is a book that takes hold of you and will leave you altered.

'These brilliant and bold artists explode off the page as they try to transcend the boundaries of the material world in their work. But the most dangerous waters they must navigate are those of the male-dominated world of the 1970s, which erases their art and identities. Sopinka explores the minefield that is loving men in an oppressively patriarchal world. And she captures the volatility and power of female friendships, and the uncharted maps of women's untameable artistic drives.' -Heather O'Neill, author of When We Lost Our Heads

'With tense and glittering writing, Heidi Sopinka's Utopia blasts the dry desert sun onto the lives and afterlives of a circle of Californian artists, the women they are and the women they love. This is a thrilling book about artistic inheritance, jealousies, and affinities.' -Leanne Shapton, author of Guestbook and Swimming Studies

'Utopia is a marvel. Vividly beguiling on art, love, and what it means to be alive, every page thrums with magic.' -Sophie Mackintosh, author of The Water Cure

By: Heidi Sopinka
Imprint: Scribe Publications
Country of Publication: Australia
Dimensions: Height: 208mm, Width: 150mm, Spine: 21mm
Weight: 312g
ISBN: 9781922310453
ISBN 10: 192231045X
Pages: 272
Publication Date: 30 August 2022
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Heidi Sopinka has worked as a bush cook in the Yukon, a travel writer in Southeast Asia, a helicopter pilot, a magazine editor, and is co-founder and co-designer at Horses Atelier. Her writing has appeared in The Paris Review, The Believer, Brick, and Lit Hub. She has won a national magazine award and was The Globe and Mail's environment columnist. The Dictionary of Animal Languages, her debut novel, was chosen by AnOther magazine as 'one of the six novels set to conquer 2018', the book of the month by the Tate, a semi-finalist for The Morning News Tournament of Books Best Novels from 2018, shortlisted for the Kobo Writing Prize, and longlisted for the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize.