I am ashamed to admit that I bought this book because the photo of the author on the back cover grabbed my attention. Putting aside the less than literary path to purchase, once I began reading Hobaek Haff's "Shame" I could not put it down. The narrator is an aging woman novelist confined by her siblings to a mental hospital because from time to time she wanders off and loses herself in a drug induced amnesia. Her confinement provides her with the opportunity to write her family history. As her narrative develops a terrible reality begins to take shape that, among many other things, connects her present condition to the Nazi occupation and her family's collaboration with and resistance to it. The writing is solid, humorous and believable. The main character's struggle to come to terms with her past and present circumstances raise compelling questions about honor, honesty and family. The ending is less solid than the body of the novel, but by no means does it spoil a very worthwhile read.

I read it in Norwegian and was stunned.I hope the translation preserved the power of this masterpiece. The book is written in such powerful language it hurts when you read it.As Idun, the main character, "hits the bottom",so do you, too.