Gregorius

This is a compelling portrait of one man's loneliness and longing, and a mesmerising study of the desires that bring people together and the fears that keep them apart.

It is suitable for readers of other literary re-inventions such as Jean Rhys' "Wide Sargasso Sea", and John Updike's "Gertrude and Claudius", and of lost classics like "Embers", of Victorian/Edwardian literature, devotees of Ibsen and Strindberg, of Hammershoi and Munch, as well as Flaubert and Zola, Chekhov and Meredith.

Aging and unattractive, the widowed Pastor Gregorius seems to have been granted a second chance at happiness when Helga, the young girl he has been fascinated by since her childhood, accepts his offer of marriage.

Yet before long, the relationship turns sour and brutal and Gregorius suspects that his wife's distaste for him has driven her into infidelity.

To Gregorius, fretful about his failing health and brooding upon mortality, the emptiness of his marriage is the final, bitter proof that he is unlovable, except in the eyes of God. And then an unexpected encounter with a woman who is able to return his affection makes it seem as though another kind of life might be possible.