Synopses & Reviews
In Falling Slowly, Anita Brookner brilliantly evokes the origins, nature, and consequences of human isolation. As middle age settles upon the Sharpe sisters, regret over chances not taken casts a shadow over their contented existence. Beatrice, a talented if uninspired pianist, gives up performing, a decision motivated by stiffening joints and the sudden realization that her art has never brought her someone to love. Miriam, usually calm and lucid, slides headlong into an affair with a charming, handsome--and very married--man. And as each woman awakens to the urgency of her loneliness, illness threatens to sever them both from the one happiness they have grown to count on: each other. Painfully wise, the Sharpe sisters embody the conflicting yearnings Jane Austen delineated in Sense and Sensibility.
Review
"In this her 18th novel, the estimable Anita Brookner tells the story of two sisters, Beatrice, a pianist, and Miriam, a translator of French books, and of the characters who cast their shadows in such quiet lives. It is a milieu in
which 'silence was a commonplace, and absence a foregone conclusion.' With characteristically exquisite prose and, at times, biting wit, the author casts her spell, luring the reader into the poignant world of vacancy to which the characters are condemned." Reviewed by Andrew Witmer, Virginia Quarterly Review (Copyright 2006 Virginia Quarterly Review)
About the Author
Anita Brookner lives in London.