Cirrus@Austlit

'In one despairing moment Theodosios abandons his wife and gorilla child and then spends a lifetime trying to get them back. But what's a lifetime in a place like this?

'One minute you're a woman. The next you're a bear. There's a woman here who is neither man nor woman. And a man who's both man and beast.

'Here nothing belongs to you - not even your grief. People steal your letters and gossip your thoughts before you've spoken them. And when they're desperate - and at some point everyone is desperate - they go to the whorehouse. . . From the centre of chaos, Mirella, the ancient whore, finds a calm place to tell this unforgettable, timeless tale.' (Publication summary)

'Double-Wolf, Brian Castro's third novel, is a brilliant fictional creation which succeeds also in being humane, utterly readable and sometimes very funny.

'It takes as its starting point the life of Wolf-Man, Freud's most famous patient who inspired his work on infant sexuality, a life revealed in counterpoint to that of Artie Catacomb, con-man, psychoanalyst and archivist, who ends his days in the Blue Mountains, relegating the Wolf-Man to the world of myth even as he avoids the baleful glare of the shop assistant who would prevent him from entirely reconstructing the Wolf-Man's story.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.