A divorced, middle-aged English professor finds himself increasingly unable to resist affairs with his female students. When discovered by the college authorities, he is expected to apologise and repent in an effort to save his job, but he refuses to become a scapegoat in what he see as as a show trial designed to reinforce a stringent political correctness. He preempts the authorities and leaves his job, and the city, to spend time with his grown-up lesbian daughter on her remote farm. Things between them are strained - there is much from the past they need to reconcile - and the situation becomes critical when they are the victims of a brutal and horrifying attack. In spectacularly powerful and lucid prose, Coetzee uses all his formidable skills to engage with a post-apartheid culture in unexpected and revealing ways. This examination into the sexual and poliitcal lawlines of modern South Africa as it tries desperately to start a fresh page in its history is chilling, uncompromising and unforgettable.

库切(J. M. Coetzee, 1940―)：南非当代著名小说家,自1974年起,先后出版了《幽暗之乡》(Dusklands, 1974)、《国之中心》(In the Heart of the Country: A Novel, 1977)、《等待野蛮人》(Waiting for the Barbarians, 1980)、《迈克尔・K.的生平与时代》(Life and Times of Michael K., 1983;获1983年布克奖)、《敌人》(Foe, 1986)、《铁的时代》(Age of Iron, 1990),以及《彼得堡的主人》(The Master of Petersburg, 1994)等多部小说,被评论界认为是当代南非最重要的作家之一。