Then she went to the powder room, where the rose petals of soap she’d brought from Paris, when the beach house was still only a postcoital tease, lay nestled in a Lucite shell. She patted the impeccable, monogrammed linen guest towels and gazed critically at herself in the mirror. But instead of touching up her lipstick or adjusting an errant strand of hair, she found herself looking into her own eyes and wondering if she would have forgiven Alice Vavasor for whatever it was she’d done. Well, she didn’t have to decide that very second; she could just wait and see what the others said. But then she was ambushed by another stray thought—would she ever do anything that would require the forgiveness of strangers?—and felt a shivery thrill of prescience.
HILMA WOLITZER is the author of several novels, including Hearts, Ending, and Tunnel of Love, as well as the nonfiction book The Company of Writers. She is a recipient of Guggenheim and NEA fellowships, and an Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. She has taught writing at the University of Iowa, New York University, and Columbia University. Hilma Wolitzer lives in New York City.
ALSO BY HILMA WOLITZER
NOVELS
Tunnel of Love
Silver
In the Palomar Arms
Hearts
In the Flesh
NONFICTION
The Company of Writers
FOR YOUNG READERS
Wish You Were Here
Toby Lived Here
Out of Love
Introducing Shirley Braverman
The Doctor’s Daughter is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2006 by Hilma Wolitzer
Reading group guide copyright © 2007 by Random House, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc. READER’S CIRCLE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
1. Fathers and daughters—Fiction. 2. Children of physicians—Fiction. 3. Parent and adult child—Fiction. 4. Adult children of aging parents—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3573.O563D63 2006
813’.54—dc22 2005048142
www.randomhouse.com
eISBN: 978-0-307-41700-8
v3.0