A Version of Love

Not since D. M. Thomas''s bestseller The White Hotel has there been such a remarkable novel about women hysteria and the profession of psychiatry as practiced by men. Set in California and Mexico in the late 1950s and early 1960s A Version of Love is a bizarrely riveting tale of transgressive desire. Its lead players form a precarious triangle: a psychoanalyst who sleeps with his patient; a female hysteric on the verge of being cured; and a loner in the Sierra foothills who goes panning for gold and then love. A dazzling achievement (Robert Olen Butler) a work of almost spookily controlled intelligence A Version of Love is a breakthrough novel by Millicent Dillon who deserves to be honored as an American master of fiction (Philip Lopate). A brilliant new novel. The assurance and economy with which she gives us this strangely gripping and powerful story...are the hallmarks of a consummate artist....Her finest work yet.Diane Johnson