NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ⢠NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, THE HUFFINGTON POST, AND SHELF AWARENESS⢠âIn Hausfrau, Anna Karenina goes Fifty Shades with a side of Madame Bovary.ââTime âA debut novel about Anna, a bored housewife who, like her Tolstoyan namesake, throws herself into a psychosexual journey of self-discovery and tragedy.ââO: The Oprah Magazine âSexy and insightful, this gorgeously written novel opens a window into one womanâs desperate soul.ââPeople Anna was...
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ⢠NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, THE HUFFINGTON POST, AND SHELF AWARENESS⢠âIn Hausfrau, Anna Karenina goes Fifty Shades with a side of Madame Bovary.ââTime
âA debut novel about Anna, a bored housewife who, like her Tolstoyan namesake, throws herself into a psychosexual journey of self-discovery and tragedy.ââO: The Oprah Magazine
âSexy and insightful, this gorgeously written novel opens a window into one womanâs desperate soul.ââPeople
Anna was a good wife, mostly. For readers of The Girl on the Train and The Woman Upstairs comes a striking debut novel of marriage, fidelity, sex, and morality, featuring a fascinating heroine who struggles to live a life with meaning.
Anna Benz, an American in her late thirties, lives with her Swiss husband, Brunoâa bankerâand their three young children in a postcard-perfect suburb of Zürich. Though she leads a comfortable, well-appointed life, Anna is falling apart inside. Adrift and increasingly unable to connect with the emotionally unavailable Bruno or even with her own thoughts and feelings, Anna tries to rouse herself with new experiences: German language classes, Jungian analysis, and a series of sexual affairs she enters with an ease that surprises even her.
But Anna canât easily extract herself from these affairs. When she wants to end them, she finds itâs difficult. Tensions escalate, and her lies start to spin out of control. Having crossed a moral threshold, Anna will discover where a woman goes when there is no going back.
Intimate, intense, and written with the precision of a Swiss Army knife, Jill Alexander Essbaumâs debut novel is an unforgettable story of marriage, fidelity, sex, morality, and most especially self. Navigating the lines between lust and love, guilt and shame, excuses and reasons, Anna Benz is an electrifying heroine whose passions and choices readers will debate with recognition and fury. Her story reveals, with honesty and great beauty, how we create ourselves and how we lose ourselves and the sometimes disastrous choices we make to find ourselves.
Praise for Hausfrau
âElegant . . . There is much to admire in Essbaumâs intricately constructed, meticulously composed novel, including its virtuosic intercutting of past and present.ââChicago Tribune
âFor a first novelist, Essbaum is extraordinary because she is a poet. Her language is meticulous and resonant and daring.ââNPRâs Weekend Edition
âWeâre in literary territory as familiar as Annaâs name, but Essbaum makes it fresh with sharp prose and psychological insight.ââSan Francisco Chronicle
âThis marvelously quiet book is psychologically complex and deeply intimate. . . . One of the smartest novels in recent memory.ââThe Dallas Morning News
âEssbaumâs poignant, shocking debut novel rivets.ââUs Weekly
âA powerful, lyrical novel . . . Hausfrau boasts taut pacing and melodrama, but also a fully realized heroine as love-hateable as Emma Bovary.ââThe Huffington Post
âImagine Tom Perrottaâs American nowheresvilles swapped out for a tidy Zürich suburb, sprinkled liberally with sharp riffs on Swiss-German grammar and European hypocrisy.ââNew York
