A Mind of Winter

March 26, 2012
Three people whose lives touched during WWII take turns narrating this haunting psychological thriller from Nayman (The Listener): Oscar, an enigmatic art collector, whose past is the book’s central mystery; Christine, Oscar’s great love, who left him after the war and fled to Shanghai, where she became enmeshed in the shadow world of drugs and prostitution; and Marilyn, a photographer with dark memories who struggles to finish a collection of wartime photos. The three have developed their own histories, differing versions of what should be the same story. When they meet again in the U.S. in 1951, they must reconsider their stories and come to terms with a hidden truth that could have changed the course of their lives. Facing this truth can be a painful process, and the suspense grows to an almost unbearable level by the time it’s revealed. Nayman’s training as a clinical psychologist serves her well. Agent: Erin L. Cox, Rob Weisbach Creative Management.

Starred review from August 1, 2012

Nayman often approaches literary fiction through the lens of clinical psychology, in which she was trained; two previous works, Awake in the Dark and The Listener, plumbed the depths of the human psyche to expose the chaotic and conflicting thoughts that motivate our actions and beliefs. Here, the period directly after World War II provides the setting for a story rife with forbidden impulses, regret, and deceit. Unfolding in three individual narratives, the novel explores a secret shared among the mysterious Oscar, who owns a mansion on Long Island; his house guest Marilyn; and his lost love Christine, who vanished into the depths of Shanghai after the war. In this classic page-turner, the connections among the three characters emerge from the very nature of the form itself, with its delineated boundaries of narration and memory. On the surface, motivation and action appear transparent, but the characters slowly reveal a psychological and physical imprisonment to the past. VERDICT A gripping psychological thriller that will appeal to readers of historical fiction; Nayman's writing is as assured as ever.--Joshua Finnell, Denison Univ. Lib., Granville, OH

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2012
In the years following WWII, the horrors of that war reverberate in the lives of the intertwined characters in Nayman's second novel, a story of guilt, mistaken identity, and love. In 1951, Oscar is being investigated for being an SS officer during the war. In flashbacks, we learn that his part-Jewish family engineered his escape from Heidelberg to London. There he made his fortune in stocks, then migrated to Long Island, where his mansion was filled most weekends with wealthy houseguests. Oscar's great love, Christine, leaves him there and sails to Shanghai, where she falls under the spell of the opium pipe, frequently provided by Barnaby, another former guest at Oscar's Long Island home, where he carried on an affair with Marilyn, a war photographer. Five years later, after Oscar's mysterious disappearance, Barnaby, Marilyn, and her husband inherit his mansion. They, and the reader, know that Oscar is alive but not why he had to vanish so suddenly from their lives. Nayman's saga delves deeply into how even those not directly affected are forever changed by war.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)