4.0
In Her Absence
ByPublisher Description
"[A] translucent novel of passion, illusion and social class....slyly witty and luminous."
—Francine Prose in O, The Oprah Magazine
During working hours, Mario is a dutiful bureaucrat, scrupulously earning his paycheck as an employee of the provincial Spanish town where he lives. But when he walks through the door of his apartment, he is transformed into the impassioned lover of Blanca, the beautiful, inscrutable wife he saved from the brink of personal crisis. For the love of Blanca, Mario eats sushi and carpaccio, nods in feigned understanding at experimental films, sits patiently through long conversations with her avant-garde friends, and conceals his disgust at shocking art exhibits.
Then, little by little, a strange and ominous threat begins to weigh on the marriage.
How can love survive its own disappearance? The desperate answer that Antonio Muñoz Molina proposes in this short, circular novella is a model of literary strategy and style, a splendid homage to Flaubert.
—Francine Prose in O, The Oprah Magazine
During working hours, Mario is a dutiful bureaucrat, scrupulously earning his paycheck as an employee of the provincial Spanish town where he lives. But when he walks through the door of his apartment, he is transformed into the impassioned lover of Blanca, the beautiful, inscrutable wife he saved from the brink of personal crisis. For the love of Blanca, Mario eats sushi and carpaccio, nods in feigned understanding at experimental films, sits patiently through long conversations with her avant-garde friends, and conceals his disgust at shocking art exhibits.
Then, little by little, a strange and ominous threat begins to weigh on the marriage.
How can love survive its own disappearance? The desperate answer that Antonio Muñoz Molina proposes in this short, circular novella is a model of literary strategy and style, a splendid homage to Flaubert.
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4.0
Thomas Goddard
Created about 1 year agoShare
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“I think I found this one in a charity shop. I can’t remember. It went onto my shelves at home and I forgot it was there until, at exactly the right time, I was heading somewhere on a bus and needed something short.
From the first few pages, I knew that this one was going to be far more interesting than its terrible cover suggested.
This is the story of Mario and Blanca and the strange particularities of their love.
I feel like I’ve lived in a very similar relationship more than once. Utterly incompatible and yet it seems to work... for a time.
The book charts their meeting, their previous relationships (and the impact they have on the current relationship).
When you fall in love, there is always the shadow of those people who were loved before close by. Like a patient audience of shadows, sat in the corner of every room. Waiting for the moment where arguments start and comparisons are drawn. When those shadows start to whisper, ‘wasn’t it the same with us?’ or ‘I never did anything so bad!’, as they always do, they bring you, faster and faster, to the thought ‘am I better off alone?’
The book really skilfully dissects the relationship and lays it out for us.
There were a few stumbles, but for the most part this was a really interesting read and it leaves you choosing a side.”

Jocelyn Young
Created about 2 years agoShare
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Lela
Created about 3 years agoShare
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Shirley Weissman
Created over 6 years agoShare
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Sanjana Rajagopal
Created over 8 years agoShare
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“I was on the verge of giving this book a 3 but the truth is that I did enjoy this and ultimately thinks it deserves the extra star for the quality of the writing. The story and the characters themselves don't intrigue me as much as the beautiful, lucid style of prose. It feels very soft, dreamlike, and wistful. Blanca was my favorite in this. She had this mysterious air to her, and I absolutely love her name..this whole book was so esoteric yet elegant.
Great read for what I might say are somewhat unexplainable reasons.”
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