Elogio de la madrasta

Known in English as In Praise of the Stepmother, this short novel tells of a Lima household made up of a wealthy man, his new wife Lucrecia and his young son Alfonso. The story is shaped by the boy's closeness to his stepmother and by the private world of desire and imagination in which the characters live.

Each chapter is paired with a famous painting that echoes its themes. The book is an elegant, openly erotic work about art, innocence and the thin line between affection and obsession, and it shows a different, more intimate side of the author.