Hausfrau is the exceptional debut novel from the prize-winning American poet, Jill Alexander Essbaum. 'The Book that will have everyone talking' Cosmopolitan
Anna Benz, an American in her late-thirties, lives with her Swiss husband, Bruno - a banker - and their three young children, in a postcard-perfect suburb of Zürich.
Though she leads a comfortable life, she is falling apart inside. Adrift and increasingly unable to connect with Bruno, or even her own feelings, Anna tries to rouse herself with new experiences: German language classes, Jungian analysis, and a series of sexual affairs she enters with an ease that surprises her.
But she soon finds that she can't easily extract herself from these relationships. Having crossed a moral threshold, Anna will discover where a woman goes when there is no going back . . .
Publisher: Pan Macmillan
ISBN: 9781447280811
Number of pages: 336
Weight: 367 g
Dimensions: 203 x 127 x 19 mm
Haunting . . . Beautifully written, the ennui of its Anna Karenina-esque heroine's deceptively perfect life as a Swiss housewife seeps from every page - Best books of 2015, Harper’s Bazaar
Hausfrau may be the Fifty Shades of literary fiction . . . This debut brilliantly chronicles a woman'slife falling apart . . . The novel's mood is, like Anna's, dreamy and dissociated . . . It is a brilliantly sustained examination of self-induced loneliness and pathological alienation. - The Times
It's the book that will have everyone talking . . . - Cosmopolitan
This slow-burning literary novel of marital disintegration will leave you in bits. It's a bleak, but beautiful read, with echoes of Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. - Glamour
A racy mix of Gone Girl and 50 Shades. - Grazia
There are echoes in Hausfrau of those other frustrated wives, Emma Bovary and Anna Karenina - Independent on Sunday
It is that impossible thing: a page-turner about depression. - Observer
A rare and remarkable debut. - Janet Fitch, bestselling author of White Oleander
An exceptional debut . . . [with] a heart-stopping climax . . . this portrait of a woman on the edge lingers long in the memory. - The Bookseller
I read this at a sitting, transfixed by this insightful and shocking portrait of a woman on the edge. - Fanny Blake, Woman and Home
2015 is shaping up to be a top year for books. Jill Alexander Essbaum's Hausfrau is a beautiful dissection of a marriage in crisis and a modern-day Anna Karenina tale. - Glamour magazine, Entertainment 2015: The Ultimate Edit
A book club winner. - Stylist, The Debut Authors to Read in 2015
A remarkable, captivating debut. I was hooked from the first line. - Paula Daly
The Girls-level frankness of the sex scenes set against the cleverly drawn Swiss banality add to the strangely hypnotic reading experience. You'll want to discuss it immediately - The Debrief
A tense novel about morality, fidelity and identity. - Elle
A piercingly astute psychological portrait of a woman sleepwalking to self-destruction. - The National
A powerful, lyrical novel, Hausfrau plumbs the psychology of a lonely, unfaithful housewife and unravels the connections between our words and our deeds. - Huffington Post
The obvious appeal of the writing is in its clever restraint and artful use of rhythm . . . The reader's attempt to understand the unhappiness of a woman surrounded by the trappings of a successful life paves the way to her character's literary predecessors, Madame Bovary and Anna Karenina - Sydney Morning Herald
Hausfrau has already generated a lot of interest, with comparisons ranging from Gone Girl to Anna Karenina . . . She's somewhat amoral and not particularly likeable, but she is an absolutely fascinating heroine and, still, strangely sympathetic - Emerald Street
Utterly compelling . . . Her searing honesty ensures the book is both gripping and wonderfully refreshing - Stylist
This novel had me from the first line: 'Anna was a good wife, mostly.' . . . An intense and chilling portrait of a woman on a mission to self-destruct. - Fanny Blake, Daily Mail
A graphic study of adultery, Hausfrau will cause a stir - Sunday Times
Ruthlessly well-written . . . It is bleak but compelling, all the way to the tragic end - Sunday Times Ireland
To the steaminess of EL James's erotic classic, it adds the marital dysfunction of Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl and the commuter neuroses of Paula Hawkins's The Girl on the Train. There won't be a sun lounger or beach bag without it this summer - Sunday Telegraph
Looks set to be a summer smash - The Sun
Anna, an American who is married to a Swiss man with three children lives in the suburbs of Zurich in Switzerland. Anna's story grips and disturbs you from the first page and you have love and hate relationship... More
Anna feels alone in the life she lives in with her husband and three children. She felt alone in America, her hometown, and she feels alone in Switzerland, her current residence. No matter where she goes and who she... More
Anna is an American living in Zurich. She has a husband and three children but she feels lost and unable to connect with anyone. This leads her to make questionable decisions with devastating results.
This book was...
More
Please sign in to write a review
Would you like to proceed to the App store to download the Waterstones App?