“The title, Terra Nova, is an homage to British Antarctic explorer Robert Falon Scott. Into her novel, Lazaridis weaves another story entirely. And the blend works.”
Description
A haunting story of love, art, and betrayal, set against the heart-pounding backdrop of Antarctic exploration—from the Boston Globe-bestselling author of The Clover House.
“Ingenious”—New York Times Book Review
The year is 1910, and two Antarctic explorers, Watts and Heywoud, are racing to the South Pole. Back in London, Viola, a photo-journalist, harbors love for them both. In Terra Nova, Henriette Lazaridis seamlessly ushers the reader back and forth between the austere, forbidding, yet intoxicating polar landscape of Antarctica to the bustle of early twentieth century London.
Though anxious for both men, Viola has little time to pine. She is photographing hunger strikers in the suffrage movement, capturing the female nude in challenging and politically powerful ways. As she comes into her own as an artist, she's eager for recognition and to fulfill her ambitions. And then the men return, eager to share news of their triumph.
But in her darkroom, Viola discovers a lie. Watts and Heywoud have doctored their photos of the Pole to fake their success. Viola must now decide whether to betray her husband and her lover, or keep their secret and use their fame to help her pursue her artistic ambitions.
Rich and moving, Terra Nova is a novel that challenges us to consider how love and lies, adventure and art, can intersect.
Reviews
“Lazaridis masterfully explores the human cost extracted from any attempt to conquer a new frontier—whether it be reaching a distant patch of ice, winning a fundamental human right, or securing artistic freedom—and forces us to contemplate what one person owes to another in the process. I was spellbound from the first polar storm and mesmerized by every click of Viola’s camera. In the end, TERRA NOVA is an exploration of the human heart, what we desire, what we require, and what we are willing to sacrifice to achieve it. I couldn’t put it down."
"At first, it’s the forbidding ice sheets of Antarctica, a 'place that offers beauty with a fist,' that dominate Henriette Lazaridis’s ingenious new novel. In contrast, the novel’s alternating narrative, set back in London in the comfortable household of Heywoud’s wife, Viola, initially seems less encumbered by intense physical sacrifice and ruthless ambition. But, as we all know, appearances can be deceiving. Lazaridis adds provocative shading to these two visions of heroism. When the two strands of the narrative unite and then combust, the 'terra nova' of the novel’s title turns out to be a 'new world' not of the land but of the mind."
"Terra Nova’s strength lies in its impressive marriage of art and exploration. Lazaridis relishes in long, gorgeous descriptions of scenes and explanations of shot-framing and darkroom photo processing as intimate as a love letter. This underlying stream of artistic enchantment hits the mark and keeps the pages turning.”