The Artist and the Feast (by Lucy Steeds)

Heat, Hunger, and Secrets Simmering in 1920s Provence

I’m always up for a good story about art and artists, so when I learned about The Artist and the Feast by Lucy Steeds I added it to my Audible library.

In the summer heat of 1920s Provence, young English journalist Joseph Adelaide arrives at the farmhouse of reclusive artist Edouard Tartuffe, hoping to write about him. He meets Ettie, Tartuffe’s niece, who runs the household and manages her uncle’s volatile moods. She longs to paint but is forbidden to, and a secret attraction grows between her and Joseph. As the summer builds, old scars surface and the three are driven toward a finale that exposes long-held secrets.

Steeds immersed me in the sweltering heat of France and the cramped, rundown cottage where three people circled one another. The heat felt less like weather and more like a pressure cooker for the tensions building between them; the house itself seemed to hold secrets ready to push through the walls. Her descriptions of the paintings, the paint supplies, and the food were exceptional—vivid enough that I could almost smell the studio and taste what was on the table.

I expected the story to center on Joseph, the young journalist who arrives hoping to write about the reclusive artist. Instead, it became Ettie’s. She is introduced as quiet and unassuming, the person who simply performs the tasks and observes everyone else. There is far more to her than the orphaned child who lost her mother young, never knew her father’s identity, and was raised by her uncle. The chapters alternate between Joseph’s and Ettie’s perspectives, and that structure let me see both the surface of the household and the deeper currents running beneath it.

The ending was clear yet left just enough ambiguity that I finished with plenty of questions about the characters. I felt satisfied, but I also wanted to stay with them a little longer.

I listened to the audiobook narrated by Tanya Reynolds. Her voice was easy to listen to and landed well, especially when she spoke for Ettie—the deeper, richer quality suited that character beautifully. A dual-narrator approach would have served the story better. Reynolds’s voice stayed too feminine for Joseph, and at times I had to pause to figure out who was speaking. That distraction was strong enough that, even though I loved the book, I suspect I would have loved it even more in print.

Overall, The Artist and the Feast is immersive, beautifully observed, and centered on a character who is far more complex than she first appears. Steeds’s prose and the shifting perspectives made the heat, the art, the food, and the buried secrets feel immediate and alive.

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