Asunder

Availability:
Ebook in EPUB format. Available for immediate download after we receive your order

DRM:
Watermark

Publication Year:
2013

ISBN-13: 9780544003514

<DIV><B>&ldquo;Lyrical and haunting&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;A beautiful portrait of urban loneliness, and the pursuit of meaning amid the barbed comforts of solitude.&rdquo; &mdash;<I>The&#160;</I><I>Economist</I></B><BR /><BR /> Marie&rsquo;s job as a security guard at the National Gallery in London offers her the life she always wanted, one of invisibility and quiet contemplation. But through the hushed corridors of England&rsquo;s largest art museum surge currents of history and violence. For in this hall filled with paintings whose power belies their own fragility, there also lingers the legacy of Marie&rsquo;s great-grandfather Ted, himself a museum guard. Decades earlier, he slipped and fell moments before reaching the suffragette Mary Richardson as she took a blade to one of the gallery&rsquo;s masterpieces on the eve of the First World War.<BR /> &#160;<BR /> After nine years on the job, Marie begins to feel the tug of restlessness. A decisive change comes in the form of a winter trip to Paris&mdash;where, with the arrival of an uninvited guest and an unexpected encounter, her carefully contained world will be torn open&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.<BR /> &#160;<BR /> The follow-up to Chloe Aridjis&rsquo;s &ldquo;charming and unconventional debut, <I>Book of Clouds</I>&rdquo; (<I>The Independent</I>),<I> Asunder</I> is a &ldquo;captivating, cerebral novel&rdquo; (<I>Booklist</I>) of beguiling depths and beautiful strangeness, exploring the delicate balance between creation and destruction, control and surrender.<BR /> &#160;<BR /> &ldquo;[An] oddly compelling tale&#160;.&#160;.&#160;. Dark and peculiar, simultaneously sinister and playful, Aridjis&rsquo; modern gothic vision will charm those prepared to linger in her cabinet of curiosities.&rdquo; &mdash;<I>Kirkus Reviews</I>, starred review<BR /> &#160;<BR /> &ldquo;Dramatic and affecting, completely coherent and oddly irresistible. It is a brilliant book.&rdquo; &mdash;<I>Publishers Weekly</I>, starred review</DIV>