Glass People: A Novel

POWERFUL. . .GODWIN IS BRILLIANT. . .DEFTLY PLOTTED AND IMAGINED. . . [It] deepened my long-cherished belief about certain forms of art: that in exploring extremities of human behavior in forcing us to wade through real or metaphorical blood such art saves us from these experiences and is cathartic in the best sense of the term.--Joyce Carol OatesThe Washington PostFrancesca married her husband Cameron an ambitious Los Angeles district attorney because he asked. Beautiful and pampered she has never worked and has never wanted to. She lives only to appreciate the finer things and to be adored. But after four years of marriage she finds herself unable to move to dress in the morning or to take the elevator outside.Lately she finds her days drifting by in a haze. Shed like to leave Cameron but the effort seems too great. Instead she visits her mother once her closest confidante now indifferent and distant. As Francesca prays for rescue change makes a surprise appearance and suddenly she is faced with the choice between an awkward life and a slow comfortable death. . . .Deceptively subtle: it would be easy to skim right over all the deep things the author is saying and read her book as a well-written surface story of a beautiful woman who makes an abortive bid for freedom....I have been crying out for contemporary womans new consciousness to express or define itself in a good novel....Here it is: Glass People by Gail Godwin.--Anatole Broyard The New York Times