The Blindfold Av Siri Hustvedt

<p><b>FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF <i>WHAT I LOVED</i></b><br><br><b>''A work of dizzying intensity . . . an intriguing and sure-handed debut '' Don DeLillo</b><br><br><b>''Brilliant . . . a dark, mesmerising debut'' <i>Independent on Sunday</i></b><br><br><b>''Hustvedt has pulled off nothing less than a re-mapping of the </b><b>modern feminist psyche'' <i>Daily Telegraph</i></b><br><br>Iris Vegan, a graduate student living alone and impoverished in New York, encounters four strong characters who fascinate and in different ways subordinate her: an inscrutable urban recluse who employs her to record the possessions of a murdered woman; a photographer whose eerie portrait of Iris takes on a life of its own; an old woman in hospital who tries to claim a remnant of the ailing Iris; and a professor she has an affair with. An exploration of female identity in an age when the old definitions - as some man''s daughter/wife/mother - no longer apply, fuelled with eroticism and a sense of menace.<br><br><b>''Attests to Hustvedt''s thoroughly original style and her lucid contemporary voice . . . the announcement of a talented writer''s arrival'' Michiko Kakutani, <i>New York Times</i></b><br><br><br><b>PRAISE FOR SIRI HUSTVEDT:</b><br><br> ''Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom'' <b>Salman Rushdie</b><br><br> ''One of our finest novelists'' <b>Oliver Sacks</b><br><br> ''Reading a Hustvedt novel is like consuming the best of David Lynch'' <b><i>Financial Times</i></b><br><br> ''Few contemporary writers are as satisfying and stimulating to read as Siri Hustvedt'' <b><i>Washington Post</i></b></p>