Disobedience
by Jane Hamilton
Random House, 2000
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Henry Shaw, a high-school senior, is as comfortable with his family as any 17-year-old can be. His father, Kevin, teaches history with a decidedly Socialist tinge at the Chicago private school Henry and his sister attend. His mother, Beth, who plays the piano in a group specializing in antique music, is a loving, attentive wife and parent. Henry even accepts the offbeat behavior of his 13-year-old sister, Elvira, who is obsessed with Civil War reenactments and insists on dressing in handmade Union uniforms at all times.

When he stumbles on his mother's email account, however, Henry realizes that everything is not quite as it seems. There, under the name Liza 38, a name which Henry innocently established for her, is undeniable evidence that his mother is having an affair with one Richard Polloco, a violin maker with a very appealing way with words and a romantic spirit, that in Henry's estimation, his own father woefully lacks.

Henry's observations, set down 10 years after that fateful year, are much more than the "old story" of adultery his mother deemed her affair to be. With her inimitable grace and compassion, Jane Hamilton has created in Disobedience a novel of gentle humor and rich insights into the nature of love and the deep, mysterious bonds that hold families together. Jane Hamilton's fourth novel was published to great critical and popular acclaim.

	© Jerry Bauer, 2001

Her second novel, A Map of the World, was also a selection of the Oprah Book Club (five years after its publication) and became an international bestseller. Her most recent novel, The Short History of a Prince, won the Chicago Tribune's Heartland Prize and was shortlisted for Britain's Orange prize.