Just $0.99 on Amazon Kindle, March 3 and 4.
Wow. My novel, The Last Bird of Paradise, celebrated its first birthday (February 22), and my publisher is giving YOU a present. For two days only, March 3 and 4, the Kindle version of the novel is just 99¢.
Winner of an International Impact Award, a Maxy Award, and a Maincrest Media Award, The Last Bird of Paradise is a powerful story about ambition, exploitation, and the ways we deceive ourselves.
Two women, nearly a century apart, seek to rebuild their lives when they reluctantly leave their homelands. Arriving in Singapore, they find romance in a tropical paradise, but also find they haven’t left behind the dangers that caused them to flee.
In the aftermath of 9/11 and haunted by the specter of terrorism, Aislinn Givens leaves her New York law practice and joins her husband in Southeast Asia when he takes a job there. Seeking to establish herself in a local law firm, Aislinn begins to understand the historic resentment of foreigners who have exploited the region for centuries. Learning about the turmoil of Singapore’s colonial period, she acquires several paintings done by an English artist during World War I that she believes are a warning to her. The artist, Elizabeth Pennington, tells her own tumultuous story through diary entries that come to an end when the war reaches the colony with catastrophic results. In the present, Aislinn and her husband learn tragically that terrorism takes many shapes when they are ensnared by local political upheaval and corruption.
In a lyrical blend of historical and contemporary drama, The Last Bird of Paradise explores the consequences of power imbalances-both domestic and geopolitical, against a lush, tropical backdrop. Clifford Garstang, author of the award-winning novel Oliver’s Travels, once again draws on his decades of experience in Asia to tell an unforgettable story of romantic intrigue.
Reviews
“Aislinn Givens leaves a settled life in Manhattan for an unsettled life in Singapore. That painting radiates mystery and longing. So does Clifford Garstang’s vivid and simmering novel, The Last Bird of Paradise.” -John Dalton, author of Heaven Lake and The Inverted Forest
“Garstang’s sympathetic imagination transports us in the manner of my favorite kind of fiction – that which convinces the reader of setting and character not because of the author’s resemblance to the protagonist but because the author is a virtuoso shapeshifter and spell weaver.” -Robin Hemley, author of Borderline Citizen: Dispatches from the Outskirts of Nationhood
“Clifford Garstang brings his experience as an attorney in Singapore to enrich a story of two women, a century apart, living parallel lives, linked by artwork that appears to come alive. Part history, part romance, part corporate intrigue, The Last Bird of Paradise is well written and propulsive-I didn’t want to put it down!” -Daphne Kalotay, author of The Archivists
“The Last Bird of Paradise is two stories of women from different periods of time and of different circumstances, but it serves to illuminate gender politics, geopolitical forces, and the results of power imbalance in many forms. Garstang gives us characters and settings that are microcosms of these forces, so the book doesn’t become didactic, but instead, offers complexity and nuance.” -Danielle Hanson, Tupelo Quarterly
Sales like this don’t happen very often, so if you’re a Kindle user, I hope you’ll take advantage of it. Paperback copies are still available, of course. Order from your favorite independent bookstore or Bookshop.org.
