de kus van de weduwe

Debut novel, a fictionalised account of almost five lonely years of mourning following the sudden death of a lover.

Four times reprint and special edition for ECI.

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QUOTES
– “ … a beautiful and mercilessly honest book… It is very impressive that Threes Anna has found her own tone so quickly, with her first book: poignant, succinct and unsentimental.”
– “ An exceptional book by an exceptional woman.”
– “A very gripping novel”

The Kiss of a Widow was selected as one of the top 3 dutch novels of 2003 by the most significant bookstore chain of Holland.

The Kiss of a Widow was on the shortlist for the literary debut price, the Plantage Debutantenprijs and on the longlist for a literary debut price ‘Vrouw & Kultuur Debuutprijs’ (Women & Culture Debut Price).

Read the short or the long excerpt of The Kiss Of A Widow, translated into English by Liz Walters.

ISBN 90 5000 503 9
NUR 301
288 pages

In straightforward prose, immediate and raw, Threes Anna transports the reader of The Kiss of a Widow into a world of loneliness and grief, into the struggle to recover meaning and happiness. The author speaks directly to the reader, moment by moment. Without embarrassment she lays bare the sense of isolation in a lonely world felt by anyone mourning the sudden loss of a lover. Lucidly and without sentimentality, she describes encountering the incomprehension of others and the harshness of those around her, the growing feeling of emptiness and the pull of the abyss.
Threes Anna has found an unusually direct and confrontational style in which to tell her story. The protagonist accompanies the reader throughout, as if sitting beside them to tell her story. She does not avoid the subject of the absence of sex. There is no escaping it.
The structure of the book makes it all the more harrowing. The reader is continually made aware of the number of days since the death of the lover by the device of a ‘perpetual calendar’. The book keeps returning to a single motif: the disposal of the lover’s possessions, which are no longer of any use and are merely gathering dust in her empty house.
Only towards the end of the book, when the world becomes milder and ‘the grief disappears from her eyes’, is there room for warmth and eroticism and, on the very last page, for love and the restoration of faith in it.

The directness and measured emotion of The Kiss of a Widow make it a very touching novel. It is a beautifully crafted account of the lonely years of mourning that follow the death of a lover, set down with unprecedented clarity and frankness, a comfort to those who will recognise themselves in the main character and an eye-opener for those who have not been through the experience themselves.

The novel has appeared in the dutch language in June 2003 Vassallucci Publishing House, Amsterdam).


Nederlands

DOWNLOAD De kus van de weduwe 4de druk
De kus van de weduwe één van de 16 BESTE ROMANS van2003 bij ScheltemaDe kus van de weduwe stond op de shortlist voor de nieuwe Nederlandse literatuurprijs, DE PLANTAGE DEBUTANTENPRIJS en op de longlist van DE VROUW EN KULTUURPRIJS. De jury schreef: Threes Anna schreef een emotioneel boek. Ze weet de eenzaamheid en het verdriet goed over te brengen. Ze doet dat in mooie taal.
…een prachtig en genadeloos eerlijk boek… Heel knap hoe Threes Anna als debutante zo snel een eigen toon heeft gevonden: raak, kernachtig en onsentimenteel’ Marie Claire‘Een bijzonder boek van een bijzondere vrouw’ Strictly
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midprice edition

special edition for ECI