A rapturous novel of love, longing, and exile, The Silent Woman depicts a twentieth century woman's life against a backdrop of war and political turmoil.Sylva, half Czech and half German, is born into an aristocratic family and lives in a castle outside Prague. She marries a man she doesn't love and is seduced by the joyful madness of Paris in the 1920s as an ambassador's wife. When the Nazis force her to state her loyalty, she capitulates, not realizing how this decision will inform and haunt the rest of her life. Sylva's story is interwoven with a contemporary sex chronicle of her son Jan, a world-renowned mathematician and émigré living in the United States, who exudes the restlessness of a man without a country.Monika Zgustova was born in Prague and lives in Barcelona. She has published seven books, including novels, short stories, a play, and a biography. La muier silenciosa (The Silent Woman, 2005) was a finalist for the National Award for the Novel, given by the Spanish Ministry of Culture. Zgustova has translated more than fifty books of Russian and Czech fiction and poetry, including the works of Milan Kundera, Anna Akhmatova, and Vaclav Havel, into Spanish and Catalan.Norman Manea is a Romanian writer and the author of The Hooligan's Return, as well as many other award-winning books. He is the Francis Flournoy Professor of European Culture and writer-in-residence at Bard College.