Shy Creatures

　　在所有失敗的關係中，都有一個轉捩點。當下或許不會被注意到，但回過頭來看時會發現，就是從那個時間點開始，所有事情逐漸走下坡。對海倫來說，就是從「繭居人」來到魏斯堡的那個週末起⋯⋯

　　故事從1964年的倫敦郊區展開，34歲的海倫．漢斯佛是魏斯堡精神醫院的藝術治療師，未婚。這樣的生活狀態讓她的中產階級父母有些失望。某天下午，她和同事們接到通報，前往附近一棟半廢棄的房屋。警方發現一位名叫威廉．塔賓的男子，數十年來足不出戶，和兩個年邁的阿姨住在這間破敗的屋子裡。如今阿姨們撒手人寰，威廉也被接往衛斯堡精神病院休養。

　　當海倫發現威廉不僅神智清楚，並賦有極高的藝術才華，威廉的康復便成了她的新任務。但當她試著挖掘威廉的人生故事時，她自己精心建立起的秘密生活，也開始慢慢瓦解。

　　作者以優美的文筆寫出人生經驗與人際關係的微妙關係，並討論受限與解放的各種樣貌。(文／博客來外文館)

　　"A beautiful story of unfolding secrets and unforeseen consequences, filled with moments that are somehow restrained and astute and gorgeously written all at the same time."

　　--Holly Gramazio, bestselling author of The Husbands

　　An alluring literary mystery full of secrets and lies, when an art teacher at a psychiatric hospital in 1960s England finds her life turned upside down by the arrival of a mysterious patient who has spent decades living in complete isolation with his elderly aunts in a decrepit Victorian house. Perfect for fans of Ann Patchett, Barbara Kingsolver, and Tessa Hadley.

　　In all failed relationships there is a tipping point. It goes unnoticed at the time but can later be identified as the beginning of the decline. For Helen it was the weekend that the Hidden Man came to Westbury Park...

　　The London suburb of Croydon,1964: Helen Hansford is unmarried and in her thirties. Something of a disappointment to her middle-class parents, she's an art therapist at the Westbury Park psychiatric hospital, where she has been having a rebellious love affair with her colleague Gil, a dashing but married doctor.

　　One spring afternoon they receive a call about a disturbance at a derelict, vine-covered Victorian house a few miles up the road. There the police find a mute, thirty-seven-year-old man called William Tapping, his hair and beard down to his waist. It appears he lives in the old house with his elderly, frail aunt, who expires as soon as she's admitted to the hospital. No one knows why William has been shut away for decades, unseen by neighbors, with only his two now-deceased aunts for company. Westbury Park becomes his refuge.

　　When it emerges that William is not only sane but a talented artist, Helen comes to see him as something of a personal project. But as she tries to solve the puzzle of the Hidden Man's past, Helen's own carefully constructed life of secrets begins to unravel...

　　A gorgeously written and life-affirming novel about life's delicate layers of experience and connection, Shy Creatures reveals all the different ways we can be confined...and liberated.