by Peter Handke

After his mother's suicide, Austrian novelist and playwright Peter Handke wanted to set down what he knew, or could say, about her life and the causes of her death before (the dull speechlessness ... the extreme speechlessness' of grief took hold forever. The result is an unsparing, deeply moving elegy in which writing keeps vigil at the limits of language, understanding, and life. This is a haunting memoir of a family tragedy by one of the most acclaimed + and controversial +contemporary writers whose style has been compared to Flaubert, Hemingway, and DeLillo. (Moving and beautifully realized.' + The New York Times Book Review