num_pages: 326
description: Its 1936 when orphaned thirteen-year-old Evalina Toussaint is admitted to Highland Hospital a mental institution in Asheville North Carolina known for its innovative treatments for nervous disorders and addictions. Taken under the wing of the hospitals most notable patient Zelda Fitzgerald Evalina witnesses cascading events that lead up to the tragic fire of 1948 that killed nine women in a locked ward Zelda among them. Author Lee Smith has created through a seamless blending of fiction and fact a mesmerizing novel about a world apart--in which art and madness are luminously intertwined.
language: English
title: Guests on Earth
publisher: A Shannon Ravenel Book