Love Burns - Softcover

Edna Mazya

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1933372087 ISBN 13: 9781933372082

Publisher: Europa Editions, 2006

Synopsis

"Endless surprise twists and hilarious scenes. The finale leaves one happily astonished."-Elena Loewenthal, La Stampa

"Starts out as a psychological drama and becomes a strange, funny, unexpected hybrid: a farce thriller. A great book."-Ma'ariv

Ilan, a middle-aged professor of astrophysics, discovers that his young wife is having an affair. Terrified of losing her, he decides to confront her lover instead. Their meeting ends in the latter's murder-the unlikely murder weapon being Ilan's pipe-and in desperation, Ilan disposes of the body in the fresh grave of his kindergarten teacher. But when the body is discovered . . .

Edna Mazya is one of Israel's most lauded and popular playwrights. In 1997 she received the Margalit Prize for her play Family Story. Her plays include The Uncle from Capetown, The Rebels, and Herod. This is her first novel.

About this title

About the Author

Mazya was born in 1949. She is one of Israel's most lauded and popular playwrights. In 1997 she received the Margalit Prize for her play Family Story. Her perfomed plays include Wien by the Sea, The Uncle from Capetown, Games in the Backyard, The Rebels, and Herod.

Reviews

In this surprisingly fresh, deeply sardonic debut novel from a famed Israeli playwright, obsessive love drives a middle-aged man to murder. Ilhan, a brilliant astrophysics professor whose life revolves around his young wife, Naomi, tries desperately to hang on to reality after uncovering her passionate affair with a charismatic nature photographer. Burdened by anxiety and self-doubt—which he treats with calls to mom and plenty of Valium cocktails— the professor tries to ignore the romance in the hope it will fizzle. His eventual confrontation with Naomi's alluring lover turns homicidal, resulting in the photographer's late-night burial in the relatively new grave of Ilhan's dead kindergarten teacher. Piling guilt and paranoia on top of overwhelming angst, the neurotic professor struggles to keep his macabre secret from Naomi, and from Anton, his buddy who just happens to be a detective. It shouldn't add up, but Mayza, in first-person narration that shifts jarringly from matter-of-fact to vertiginous, makes Ilhan at once identifiable and deeply alien. She skillfully conveys a personality in collapse, while satirizing every one of the clichés to which it succumbs. (Mar.)
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In this debut novel, award-winning Israeli playwright Mazya offers a mordant meditation on the assets and liabilities of a May-December romance. Middle-age astrophysics professor Ilan Ben Nathan suspects his nubile young wife, Naomi, is having an affair. After observing Naomi and her lover in the midst of a tryst, he decides to confront the man (a disheveled Russian immigrant who's a dead ringer for Nick Nolte) at his Haifa abode. A moment of rage leads to murder with a weapon that's an ingenious twist on the proverbial smoking gun. Ilan must determine how best to dispose of the body, and he turns to his unsentimental mother, who offers a macabre solution that alters both of their lives. A professor of dramatic writing at Tel Aviv University, Mazya renders complex characters and clever dialogue, though Ilan's stream-of-consciousness reflections may be tiresome for some. This European best-seller is sure to win over American readers with its provocative blend of sly humor and suspense. Allison Block
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Europa Editions
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1933372087
• ISBN 13: 9781933372082
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 220