Zoe Heller; Z. Heller

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Heller's stirring novel that chronicles the friendship between two schoolteachers is now a major motion picture from Fox Searchlight, starring Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench....

Willy Muller has survived imprisonment for murdering his wife, years of hate mail from the public, and, most recently, the suicide of his daughter, Sadie. While recuperating from a heart attack, he finds himself drawn into the lonely world of his late daughter's dairies....

When the new teacher, Sheba, first arrives, Barbara immediately senses that this woman will be different from the rest of her staff-room colleagues. Before too long, Sheba is involved in an illicit affair with a pupil. Barbara finds the relationship abhorrent, of course, but she is the only adult in whom Sheba can properly confide in....