The Idea of Perfection
Books / Paperback
ISBN: 0142002852 / Publisher: Penguin Books, October 2003
The winner of the 2001 Orange Prize serves up a poignant story about an unlikely romance in the Australian bush between Douglas Cheesman, a shy and awkward engineer, and Harley Savage, a plain, large-boned woman who works as a museum curator. Reprint.
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Harley Savage is a plain woman, a part-time museum curator and quilting expert with three failed marriages and a heart condition. Douglas Cheeseman is a shy, gawky engineer with jug-handle ears, one marriage gone sour, and a crippling lack of physical courage. They meet in the little Australian town of Karakarook, where Harley has arrived to help the town build a heritage museum and Douglas to demolish the quaint old Bent Bridge. From the beginning they are on a collision course until the unexpected sets them both free. Elegantly and compassionately told, The Idea of Perfection is reminiscent of the work of Carol Shields and Annie Proulx and reveals Kate Grenville as "a writer of extraordinary talent" (The New York Times Book Review).
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