In the same delectable format as The Matisse Stories, this collection deals with betrayal and loyalty, quests and longings, loneliness and passion - the mysterious absences at the heart of the fullest lives. A scholar pursues an elusive biographer, stumbling upon buried fragments of distant lives; a woman walks out of her previous existence and encounters an ice-blond stranger from a secretive world; a schoolgirl draws a blood-filled picture of jael; a swimming pool reveals a beauteous monster in its depths. The settings range from the heart of Provence in summer to the cold forests of Scandinavia, form chalk-strewn classrooms to herbscented hillsides, from suburban streets to rocky wilds.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 240
Edition: First Thus
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 28 Oct 1999
ISBN 10: 0099273764
ISBN 13: 9780099273769
Book Overview: 'The short stories unroll swift and glittering like a bolt of magic cloth' - Sunday Telegraph From the Booker Prize-winning author of Possession.