A National Book Critics Circle Award–winning novel and "a narrative of dazzling virtuosity" about love, death and the afterlife ( Publishers Weekly). Baritone Bay, mid-afternoon. A couple, naked, married almost thirty years, are lying murdered in the dunes. "Their bodies had expired, but anyone could tell—just look at them—that Joseph and Celice were still devoted. For while his hand was touching her, curved round her shin, the couple seemed to have achieved that peace the world denies, a period of grace, defying even murder. Anyone who found them there, so wickedly disfigured, would nevertheless be bound to see that something of their love had survived the death of cells. The corpses were surrendered to the weather and the earth, but they were still a man and wife, quietly resting; flesh on flesh; dead, but not departed yet." "A tour de force." — Library Journal "A work of near-genius . . . [by] one of the most distinctive and talented writers of our time." — Literary Review "Magnificent." — The Sunday Telegraph "A brilliant, astonishing novel." — The Times (London)
