Husband and Wife

This is an amazing novel. Zeruya Shalev exposes the pain of a deteriorating family with an uncanny sense of what is true. She proves that there are some experiences that transcend gender, culture, and time. This novel explores difficult situations and emotions with guts and grace. I savored every word.

I am an American who has lived in Israel off and on for about 15 years. I think that Husband and Wife is the best book I've ever read by an Israeli author, and one of the best books I've ever read by any author. It goes deep into the relationship between the characters, deep into the female psyche, and perfectly captures the many tensions of women trying to juggle their work and home lives. This book left me shaken.

Shalev is an incredible writer. She describes the murky deep areas of human emotion. A place where few of us have the courage to go, even with our inner-most thoughts. Shockingly painful truths wallpaper this novel from beginning to end. For most mainstream americans, this will be a difficult book to read because there is not much of a storyline, compared with light-weight american novels. But the poetic inner-dialoge of the characters is very powerful, I did't want to put the book down. One enters into a kind of trance while reading it. A sad but true commentary on modern relationships.