Alice Brill wakes up one day with a vague, but nagging sensation of unease in her chest that signals trouble. Is it her marriage-drifting along for years on auto-pilot-that's so troubling? Her unrealized aspirations as a writer? Her unsettled younger son? Or is it something about her father, once a prominent surgeon but now slipping deeper into senility in a nursing home? There is also the matter of the writer whose book she's editing, in her new profession as a "book doctor," with whom a deeper involvement looms. This is a smart, beautifully observed novel about a woman coming to terms with the hidden truths of her life.
Alice Brill has an intimation of something gone wrong. Her father is in a nursing home. Her marriage has been left to fend for itself, and her youngest child shows himself to be irresponsible. Anna Fields has chosen a minor key in which to read this novel. That's acceptable for some of the disappointments that move the story, but she rarely gives a bright color to the characters. The men bark their words out in tones that make them all sound angry. The dialogue is sometimes lively and varied and uses a wide vocal range, but the tempo of a sentence or a phrase or a paragraph never alters from the one preceding it. J.P. (c) AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine
The Boston Globe...
Wolitzer makes art of ordinary life.
About the Author
Hilma Wolitzer is the author of several novels, including Hearts, Ending, and Tunnel of Love. She is a recipient of Guggenheim and NEA Fellowships, an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Barnes & Noble Writer for Writers Award. She has taught at the University of Iowa, New York University, and Columbia University. She lives in New York City.
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