The Woman Upstairs
Back of the Book
From the New York Times best-selling author of The Emperor's Children, a brilliant new novel: the riveting confession of a woman awakened, transformed, and betrayed by passion and desire for a world beyond her own. Nora Eldridge, a thirty-seven-year-old elementary school teacher in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who long ago abandoned her ambition to be a successful artist, has become the "woman upstairs," a reliable friend and tidy neighbor always on the fringe of others' achievements. Then into her classroom walks Reza Shahid, a child who enchants as if from a fairy tale. He and his parents--dashing Skandar, a Lebanese scholar and professor at the École Normale Supérleure; and Sirena, an effortlessly glamorous Italian artist--have come to Boston for Skandar to take up a fellowship at Harvard. When Reza is attacked by schoolyard bullies who call him a "terrorist," Nora is drawn into the complex world of the Shahid family: she finds herself falling in love with them, separately and together. Nora's happiness explodes her boundaries, until Sirena's careless ambition leads to a shattering betrayal.
We Love It Because
“Just because something is invisible doesn’t mean it isn’t there. At any given time, there are a host of invisibles floating among us.” Messud closely observes two modes of being invisible in this sharp follow-up to the excellent ‘The Emperor’s Children’. Reader’s are gripped by the slow envelopment of Nora Eldrige’s life into the sparkling and intriguing lives of the Shahids, a dark and compelling cast of characters shimmer on the page and burrow into the reader’s mind, relentlessly.
Memorable Passage
When you’re a girl, you never let on that you are proud, or that you know you’re better at history, or biology, or French, than the girl who sits beside you and is eighteen months older. Instead you gush about how good she is at putting on nail polish or at talking to boys, and you roll your eyes at the vaunted difficulty of the history/biology/French test and say, ‘Oh my God, it’s going to be such a disaster! I’m so scared!’ and you put yourself down whenever you can so that people won’t feel threatened by you, so they’ll like you, because you wouldn’t want them to know that in your heart, you are proud, and maybe even haughty, and are riven by thoughts the revelation of which would show everyone how deeply Not Nice you are. You learn a whole other polite way of speaking to the people who mustn’t see you clearly, and you know—you get told by others—that they think you’re really sweet, and you feel a thrill of triumph: ‘Yes, I’m good at history/biology/French, and I’m good at this, too.’ It doesn’t ever occur to you, as you fashion your mask so carefully, that it will grow into your skin and graft itself, come to seem irremovable.
About the Author
Claire Messud, born on August 16, 1966, is a highly acclaimed American-Canadian novelist and literary scholar, recognized for her insightful explorations of human relationships and the complexities of identity. With a keen eye for nuance and an exquisite command of language, Messud has crafted a body of work that delves into the intricacies of the human psyche. Her novels, such as The Emperor's Children and The Woman Upstairs, have earned widespread critical acclaim for their thought-provoking narratives and rich characterizations. Messud's ability to navigate the emotional terrain of her characters and dissect societal expectations sets her apart as a writer worth knowing. Beyond her fiction, Messud has contributed essays to prestigious publications, showcasing her intellectual prowess and engagement with contemporary issues. Claire Messud's work is a testament to the power of literature to illuminate the intricacies of the human experience, making her a compelling and influential voice in modern literature.
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