Two Lives - Reading Turgenev & My House in Umbria (Paperback)

"Two Lives offers two superb novels in one volume . . . as rich and moving as anything I have read in years. . . . Marvelous." --"The Guardian"
Presented here are two unforgettable short novels by acclaimed author William Trevor, both of which focus on women who retreat into their imaginations until the boundaries between what is real and what is not become blurred.
In "Reading Turgenev," an Irish country girl is trapped in a loveless marriage with an older man, but she finds release in secret meetings with a man who shares her passion for Russian novels. This novella was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
The second novella, "My House in Umbria," tells how romantic novelist Emily Delahunty helps the survivors of a bomb attack on a train by inventing colorful pasts for her patients.

"A sensibility reigns here which is at once inquisitive and loving. . . . Trevor's is among the most subtle and sophisticated fiction being written today." --John Banville, "The New York Review of Books"
"A writer at the peak of his powers; Two Lives] reminds you what good reading is all about." --Anne Tyler, "Chicago Sun Times"
"One of the most beautiful and memorable things Trevor has written." --"The Independent on Sunday" (U.K.)