The Dumb House (2010)
“I could have worked at home all the time: it was quiet, I had everything I needed, and nobody ever came to the house. Sometimes I worked all night in the upstairs study. Sitting there, alone, surrounded by Mother’s books, I felt a heightened awareness of everything around me; my skin was stretched tight as a drum; every sound reverberated in my spine; I registered every draught of air, every change in temperature. I could feel the deer moving in the woods, or drifting along the hedges; I heard ...dogs and foxes barking from miles away. At three in the morning, I would go out and stand in the garden. I would look up at the sky; I would taste the cool night air and I would feel as if I was the only person left in the whole universe, the one observer who was making it all happen. If anything, my visits to Karen Olerud had made me even more aware of my isolation in that house, but I had no desire to return. If I sometimes paused, in the middle of the day, remembering her wet flesh, I drove the image from my mind immediately.MoreLess
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