"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
This sounds, at first glance, like the premise of a run-of-the-mill missing-persons detective story. But Barbara Hodgson embellishes this simple tale with a baroque narrative style that suggests a symbolic order to Helen's anxious search. The mystery entwines with Helen's metaphysical and emotional quest for solace after the death of her relationship. Helen becomes obsessed with bodies--her own and those of her fellow travelers: "Helen woke up wearing someone else's eyes. Eyes that shattered her orbs into a thousand piercing splinters, that shook her balance off its pivot and flung her headlong into a mercurial fog." In several similar waking scenes, Helen imagines her breasts swelling and shrinking or her body parts mingling with others' as they look on. Throughout the book, she sees and feels and tastes and touches with fine-grained detail, and her bizarre body consciousness moves so easily from a dreamlike fantasy back into the prose of the mystery narrative that a dogmatic reader is apt to become frustrated if he or she demands a dogged pursuit of clues and solutions. But straightforward mystery is not Hodgson's method. The intersubjectivity of her characters is drawn in a poetic language that, like the exquisite and macabre color illustrations interlaced with the text, are meant to estrange sensory experiences and evoke consciousness of embodied existence. Hodgson's first book, The Tattooed Map (1995), was a similarly rich book of illustrations and intelligent prose, but The Sensualist is a more robust novel, a sophisticated artistic achievement that represents a significant literary talent. --Patrick O'Kelley
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Shipping:
US$ 4.00
Within U.S.A.
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Fast Shipping and good customer service. Seller Inventory # Holz_New_081181906X
Book Description Condition: new. Seller Inventory # FrontCover081181906X
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed. Seller Inventory # think081181906X
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Seller Inventory # Wizard081181906X
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Seller Inventory # Abebooks587443
Book Description Condition: New. New. In shrink wrap. Looks like an interesting title! 1.75. Seller Inventory # Q-081181906x
Book Description Condition: New. New. In shrink wrap. Looks like an interesting title! 1.75. Seller Inventory # Q-081181906X
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Brand New!. Seller Inventory # VIB081181906X