A Week in October

April 28, 2008
Chilean author Subercaseaux's intense and engrossing novel (the first one to be translated into English) delves deeply into the troubled psyche and marriage of a woman dying of cancer. In the last months of her life, 46-year-old Clara Griffin, the reserved, childless, well-to-do wife of architect Clemente Balmaceda, begins a fictionalized journal that her husband will secretly read and agonize over. In alternating chapters, Subercaseaux (the great-great-granddaughter of composer Robert Schumann) sets up a coiled tension between what Clara has written, an intimate roman à clef about her coming death and lack of passion for her husband, and her husband's reaction. Clemente is by turns bewildered by her “embellishments” and shocked by her revelations. The crux of Clara's grief stems from Clemente's longstanding affair with another woman, which Clara, as Clemente learns from her notebook, has endured in silence for years. A method of instilling desire, exacting vengeance or simply finding happiness, Clara's notebook digs into the slippery, treacherous nature of love, deception, truth, guilt and loyalty.

July 15, 2008
Diagnosed with a fatal illness, Clara Griffin begins to keep a journal or write a novel. Which is it? Her husband, Clemente, a successful architect, discovers the notebook and reads it avidly. Is it all true, or is it made up? Does she really think him a smug, complacent bore? How did she find out he had a mistress? Did she really have a passionate affair in the midst of her illness? Did she know he was reading the notebook? This extraordinary novel weaves mystery with suffering, erotic tension, and human resilience. Chilean journalist and fiction writer Subercaseaux has published prolifically, but this is her first novel to be translated into English. One hopes that more will soon follow. Highly recommended.Mary Margaret Benson, Linfield Coll. Lib., McMinnville, OR

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from July 1, 2008
Chilean writer Subercaseauxs sublime American debut asks this question: How well do we really know our life partners? As the novel opens, 46-year-old Clara Griffin witnesses her lovers death as she ponders her own. She has been diagnosed with cancer, and as her body begins to weaken, she clings to life by writing her autobiography. Her adulterous husband, Clemente, happens upon Claras writings, which are packed with breathless descriptions of her erotic adventures and mortal fears. He is shocked to learn not only of her tryst but of her knowledge of his. (He thought his mistress, Eliana, had been a secret all these years.) Should he keep his discovery mum, or confront his wife, in her increasingly frail state? Claras opus mixes fiction and fact, but Clemente knows that beneath that literary veneer is the story of a woman worn down by a marriage bereft of love. Told from the perspective of both Clara and her spouse, Subercaseauxs slim, elegant novel deftly blends nuance and suspense. Of his ailing wife, Clemente writes: Clara was right when she said her illness was like an octopus that increasingly invaded the spiritual and physical space of their relationship. It left no room for anything else.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)