The critically acclaimed author of The Center of Things, hailed as "an engaging novel about big ideas" by The New York Times Book Review, turns her razor-sharp pen on the offbeat worlds of soap operas, mistaken identities, private detectives, and sibling rivalries as she deftly navigates the territory between coincidence and fate. With its sly charm and witty sophistication, this is another sparkling gem from a rising literary star.Available only in Basic 7.

It's 1948, and postwar Rome is giddy and chaotic. Poet Dante Sabat is attending yet another film industry soiree at Tullio Merlini's apartment off the Via del Corso. Disaffected and deeply self-absorbed, Dante finds Tullio's glamorous evenings tedious but welcomes any distraction. This rainy evening, the distraction is double: sisters Gladys and Prudence Godfrey, both beautiful, sharp-witted, and remarkably compelling American actresses who have recently arrived in Rome. As the new acquaintances leave the party together, it marks the beginning of a story of three damaged people struggling to...