Portrait of a Girl by Dörthe Binkert, a historical novel of self-discovery and artistic inspiration

The Hotel Spa Maloja, a ritzy venue high in the Swiss Alps, is the scene for life-changing encounters and romantic entanglements during the summer of 1896. In her uneven but ultimately worthwhile second novel, Binkert sets up an interesting convergence of personalities and social classes, with a vast gap between the wealthy hotel guests, there for a health cure or to photograph the views, and the impoverished, proud locals.

The large cast includes a flirtatious Englishman and his best friend, a young woman with bad lungs, a family of mountain farmers, Italian pastoral painter Giovanni Segantini, and a bitchy American socialite who could have sprung from a Jackie Collins book. The main plotline centers on Nika, a mute stranger with striking strawberry-blond hair who endured a traumatic childhood and who’s searching for her true identity. Readers follow her on her journey of self-discovery, which is alternately helped and impeded by the men who fall in love with her.

I found the novel rough going early on. The translation has some odd phrasings for a historical novel (“he didn’t suck up to people”). The story jumped from viewpoint to viewpoint with abandon, and few people felt distinct. Fortunately, after enough time in the clear mountain air, they and their motives began to sharpen, and the reading became smoother. My interest was also piqued after discovering the novel imagines the backstory of a real painting, Segantini’s La Vanità (which looks nothing like the demure image on the book’s cover!).

Binkert is gifted at describing the beautiful Engadine region and evoking her characters’ deep, swirling emotions. Another strong point is her depiction of a master artist at work in his preferred element, outdoors, where he can mix the perfect palette of colors and “capture the harmony of light.” Overall, a good choice for readers in search of thoughtful escapism.

Portrait of a Girl was published by AmazonCrossing, Amazon's imprint for translated fiction, in September 2014 ($14.99/£8.99/$4.99 ebook).  Margot Bettauer Dembo translated it from the original German.  This review, which first appeared in November's Historical Novels Review, was based on a personal purchase via Kindle First.

And here's Giovanni Segantini's La Vanità, below.