Cool. Balanced. Modern. The precisions of science, the wild variance of lust, the catharsis of confession and the fear of failure - these are things that happen in the Glass Room. High on a Czechoslovak hill, the Landauer House shines as a wonder of steel and glass and onyx built specially for newlyweds Viktor and Liesel Landauer, a Jew married to a gentile. But the radiant honesty of 1930 that the house, with its unique Glass Room, seems to engender quickly tarnishes as the storm clouds of WW2 gather, and eventually the family must flee, accompanied by Viktor's lover and her child. But the house's story is far from over, and as it passes from hand to hand, from Czech to Russian, both the best and the worst of the history of Eastern Europe becomes somehow embodied and perhaps emboldened within the beautiful and austere surfaces and planes so carefully designed, until events come full-circle.

西蒙·莫尔生于1948年，在英国、塞浦路斯和马耳他度过童年时代，毕业于牛津大学基布尔学院，获得动物学学位。大器晚成的他39岁才出版第一部小说《喀迈拉》，却一举夺得了麦基特里克奖。接二连三出版了几部作品后，《孟德尔的侏儒》再度奠定了他在大西洋两岸的文学地位，《纽约时报》将这本书描述为一部“有雄心勃勃的主题和诙谐的小说”。

2009年，他受到二十年代建于捷克城市布尔诺的图根达特别墅的启发，西蒙?莫尔创作了涵盖建筑、爱情、时代及命运的《玻璃屋》，入选当年布克奖短名单。2012年，莫尔构思巧妙的惊悚小说《天上掉下的女孩》又为他在欧美文学世界里赢得了不小的赞誉。

虽然笔耕不辍，但是莫尔始终没有放弃他的专业。在过去的三十年中，他一直跟妻子及两个孩子居住在意大利，在罗马教授生物学。