LUNDGREN, ERIC
Trude is an imaginary town situated in a diffused territory that occupies the center of the United States. It is a city carefully constructed by an architect from Central Europe who wants to leave his mark on city planning. Though, Trude has become a place to "lose yourself," as one tourist brochure puts it: a treacherous maze of convoluted shopping malls, barricaded libraries, and elitist assisted-living homes. One night at Trude's opera house, the theater's most celebrated mezzo-soprano vanishes during rehearsal. When police come up empty-handed, the star's husband, a disconsolate legal clerk named Sven Norberg, must take up the quest on his own. Faced with the loss of everything he loves, Norberg follows his investigation to the heart of the city and through the buildings of a possibly insane modernist architect called Bernhard, whose elaborate vision will offer him an astonishing revelation. Written with boundless intelligence and razor-sharp wit, u003ciu003eFachadas u003c/iu003eis a comic and existential mystery that unfolds at the urgent pace of a thriller.
