Twelve-year-old piano prodigy Marcus embarks on a student-teacher relationship with the flamboyant and slightly mysterious Madame Sousatzka. Her unconventional teaching methods quickly improve Marcus’s already impressive playing, but things quickly get strange. Marcus becomes very attached to Madame Sousatzka and her three kooky borders - Mr. Cordle, an osteopath who obsessively creates color-coded maps of the human body ; The Countess, an unkempt, chain-smoking daydreamer who prefers to be called “Uncle”; and Jenny, a young, kindhearted prostitute. Marcus looks to Madame Sousatzka as a mother figure who is, on the surface, everything his own mother is not – sophisticated, worldly, and glamorous. In return, he fills a void in her life caused by missed opportunities and crushed dreams. As a result, she desperately clings to him and attempts to live through his achievements.

Rubens does a wonderful job of articulating the loneliness and desperation of the characters and their tendency to suffocate the objects of their affection. Even Madame Sousatzka’s dilapidated house comes alive as a character, mirroring the sadness and slow decay of its inhabitants. In addition, I found myself quite touched by Marcus’s complex relationship with his mother. He loves her so much that it is painful, but he is horribly embarrassed by her, which then causes him guilt, creating a vicious cycle of love-pain-embarrassment-guilt. This novel is wonderful, and I highly recommend it. And, wow, I really like Bernice Rubens. ( )