Finding Zoë Through Her Art

I was 18 years old when my mother died. I chose — as teenagers do — to look forward rather than back. I spent my twenties travelling the world, learning languages, building a life. And somewhere in that time, I forgot the sound of her voice. Decades later, I discovered she had left behind a scattered collection of extraordinary artwork — pencil drawings of astonishing detail and quiet feeling, each one held in the home of someone who had loved her. So I went to find them. Finding Zoë Through Her Art is what happened next. It is fifteen chapters about fifteen people who knew her better than I did. It is a book about birds and butterflies, bohemian artists and broken marriages, long ferry rides and snowbound cabins and strangers who cried when they opened a picture of a butterfly. It is about what gets left behind when someone dies — and what you discover when you finally go looking. My mother’s name was Zoë Payne. She was funny and difficult and deeply spiritual and impossibly talented. She died in 2001. I am still getting to know her. This book is for anyone who has ever loved someone they didn’t know well enough.