Mr. Gauguin's Heart (Hardcover)

~ Marie-Danielle Croteau (Author), Isabelle Arsenault (Illustrator), Susan Ouriou (Translator)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Based on a true story, Mr. Gauguin’s Heart is about the birth of imagination and the solace of art. Young Paul Gauguin sailed from Denmark to Peru with his family: his mother, his father, his sister, Marie, and his odd-looking, imaginary orange dog. At first being on the boat was fun; he loved to walk his dog on the ship’s bridge. Then one day, Paul found his mother in tears; his father had died.

When the ship docked, Paul refused to leave. Then an old man took him by the hand and in a few brush strokes, he had stirred a passion that lay just beneath the boy’s surface. He had shown Paul how to paint, but, more than that, he taught him how to bring his memories to life.

Mr. Gauguin’s Heart is a charming and heartwarming story of how, as a boy, Paul Gauguin learned to channel his grief from the death of his father and pour it into his first painting — one that would pave the way to many masterpieces.

About the Author

Marie-Danielle Croteau was born in Quebec, where she studied communications and art history in university. Croteau has worked for both Radio-Canada and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. Over the course of twenty years, she has lived in Africa, France, the Caribbean, French Polynesia, and Central America. She has also crossed the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans in a sailboat with her husband and her two kids, both born in Africa. During her travels, she wrote her first novel, which was published in 1993. Croteau is now a widely recognized author for both children and adults. She splits her time between Quebec City and Costa Rica.

Isabelle Arsenault is a graphic-design graduate who has applied her skills to illustration. She contributes to magazines and newspapers across the US and Canada, and has been the recipient of major illustration awards such as the prestigious Governor General’s Literary Awards for Illustration, Communication Arts Illustration Annual, and the National Magazine Awards of Canada. Arsenault lives in Montreal, and Le coeur de monsieur Gauguin, the original French version of Mr. Gauguin’s Heart, is her first book.

Susan Ouriou is a Calgary-based novelist, interpreter, and translator of fiction. One of her greatest pleasures is sharing with English readers, young and old, the stories she loves in French and Spanish. A runner-up for the John Glassco Translation Prize for The Thirteenth Summer and two-time finalist for the Governor General’s Award for Translation for The Road to Chlifa and Necessary Betrayals, she has some twenty translations to her credit as well as her own novel Damselfish. Currently, Ouriou is busy writing her second novel.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 4-8
  
• Hardcover: 24 pages
• Publisher: Tundra Books; Tra edition (September 11, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0887768245
• ISBN-13: 978-0887768248
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 8.4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,599,734 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Based on a true story, it tells youngsters how to turn tragedy into success., November 4, 2007

By	Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

Marie-Danielle Croteau's MR. GAUGUIN'S HEART is a winning story translated by Susan Ouriou and illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault, telling of the boy painter Gauguin and how he turned grief into a painting which would set his career. Based on a true story, it tells youngsters how to turn tragedy into success.