THE PARASOL FLOWER

Ask your local library to stock a copy! Or buy it wherever you buy good books: AMAZON, BARNES & NOBLE, CHAPTERS / INDIGO, WATERSTONES, FOYLES, KOBO, BOKUS, DYMOCKS, BOOK DEPOSITORY, and more.

Praise for The Parasol Flower:

• Foreward Reviews’ Monica Carter says: “The book’s language is as verdant as the flora and fauna that surrounds Hannah…The Parasol Flower is a visceral, captivating novel about charisma, commitment, and the need for connection—an elegant and wistful portrayal of two women from different eras searching for each other.”

• Editor’s Choice at the Historical Novel Society: “Quevillon’s début novel The Parasol Flower masterfully merges known facts and unknown fancy…”

• Read TripFiction’s review of The Parasol Flower: “…a début novel by Canadian Karen Quevillon, and it is a cracker.”

• 4.44/5 stars on Goodreads: readers say: “…captivating, sensual…such a delightful escape during this dreary pandemic… What a gorgeous book!”

Nancy Roach has fled her dissertation advisor for Paris, where her PhD research is proving fruitless. When her curiosity is piqued by an illustration of “The Parasol Flower” in a 19th century treatise, she is drawn into the life of Hannah Inglis, an unknown but talented artist who slipped out of art history and into the Malaysian wilderness.

Working from Hannah’s letters and a cache of paintings—all of which have ended up, mysteriously, in the possession of the defamed Peterborough-Munk family—Nancy attempts to reconstruct a pivotal year in Hannah’s life.

The year is 1896, and in Kuala Kangsa, British Malaya, Hannah struggles to keep painting. Her husband and their expatriot circle increasingly oppose her art-making and its “uncivilizing” influence. Hannah finds support from two unlikely sources, the intimidating Eva Peterborough, an evolutionary biologist, and the Sikh police sergeant Darshan Singh who assists on treks to paint en plein air.

They are searching for a rare and legendary specimen—a flower that blooms as big as a lady’s parasol. Eva agrees to cover for Hannah and the Sergeant as they explore the mountainous jungle on her family’s estate. But nothing that’s meant for an audience can stay hidden. The science that Eva and Charles Peterborough are discretely pursuing at Idlewyld will polarize the two friends, put the townspeople in turmoil, and change Hannah’s life forever.