About the Author

Siri Hustvedt's first novel, THE BLINDFOLD, was published by Sceptre in 1993 and her second, THE ENCHANTMENT OF LILY DAHL, followed in 1997. Her third novel, WHAT I LOVED, was published in 2003 to even greater acclaim and has been an international success. Her work has been published in The Paris Review, Fiction, and The Best American Short Stories, and she is also the author of Reading to You, a poetry collection, and three collections of essays, Yonder, Mysteries of the Rectangle: Essays on Painting, and A PLEA FOR EROS. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Reviews

A love story with the grip and suspense of a thriller. It makes you ponder human existence with a peculiar mixture of stoicism and wonder - Times Literary Supplement on WHAT I LOVEDA big, wide, sensuous novel - clever, sinister, yet attractively real - Julie Myerson, Guardian on WHAT I LOVEDA writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom. - Salman Rushdie on WHAT I LOVEDSubstantial, moving and beautifully written - Independent on Sunday on WHAT I LOVEDFull of humour, surprise and powerful images - Observer on THE ENCHANTMENT OF LILY DAHLBrilliant . . . a dark, mesmerising debut - Independent on Sunday on THE BLINDFOLD

In her fourth novel (following the acclaimed What I Loved), Hustvedt continues, with grace and aplomb, her exploration of family connectedness, loss, grief and art. Narrator and New York psychoanalyst Erik Davidsen returns to his Minnesota hometown to sort through his recently deceased father Lars's papers. Erik's writer sister, Inga, soon discovers a letter from someone named Lisa that hints at a death that their father was involved in. Over the course of the book, the siblings track down people who might be able to provide information on the letter writer's identity. The two also contend with other looming ghosts. Erik immerses himself in the text of his father's diary as he develops an infatuation with Miranda, a Jamaican artist who lives downstairs with her daughter. Meanwhile, Inga, herself recently widowed, is reeling from potentially damaging secrets being revealed about the personal life of her dead husband, a well-known novelist and screenplay writer. Hustvedt gives great breaths of authenticity to Erik's counseling practice, life in Minnesota and Miranda's Jamaican heritage, and the anticlimax she creates is calming and justified; there's a terrific real-world twist revealed in the acknowledgments. (Apr.) Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.

A love story with the grip and suspense of a thriller. It makes you ponder human existence with a peculiar mixture of stoicism and wonder - Times Literary Supplement on WHAT I LOVEDA big, wide, sensuous novel - clever, sinister, yet attractively real - Julie Myerson, Guardian on WHAT I LOVEDA writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom. - Salman Rushdie on WHAT I LOVEDSubstantial, moving and beautifully written - Independent on Sunday on WHAT I LOVEDFull of humour, surprise and powerful images - Observer on THE ENCHANTMENT OF LILY DAHLBrilliant . . . a dark, mesmerising debut - Independent on Sunday on THE BLINDFOLD