The Natural Order of Things is a tale of two families and the secrets that bind them. The voices of Antunes' characters -- an army officer being tortured in prison on charges of conspiracy; an elderly man, once a miner in Mozambique, now reduced to dreams of "flying underground"; a diabetic teenage girl and the middle-aged husband she despises; the officer's illegitimate sister, locked away to haunt the house like Bertha Rochester in Jane Eyre -- create a portrait of a disintegrating Portugal, a personal political history that attains the brilliance and surreality of Elias Canetti and Nikolai Gogol.
- ISBN10 0802138136
- ISBN13 9780802138132
- Publish Date 16 May 2001
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 1 June 2024
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Grove Press / Atlantic Monthly Press
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 320
- Language English