More recent touchstones include Doireann Ní Ghríofa’s A Ghost in the Throat, Danielle Dutton’s Margaret the First and Cristina Rivera Garza’s The Taiga Syndrome. You're like an old piece of pie I can't throw away, a very good pie. Please do not listen to my private moments. In the end the perfectly timed hysteria comes not from a woman but from Vitoria's husband, who just wants his wife to conform: "They feel sorry for me! And now I know why. There are strong echoes of Daphne du Maurier and Kate Chopin, and other more literal references to the likes of Jean Rhys, Clarice Lispector and Octavia Butler. Personifying this is the figure of Solange, a housemaid who refuses the friendship offered by Vitoria, in a series of tense interactions that culminates truthfully and without drama: “ ‘I’ve never liked you, madame, but truly I had no idea just how much.’ ” Pressure to conform But it also cuts her off from all that she has known before. Leaving behind her life as a cleaner to take up the role of wife in upper-class society gives Vitoria advantages – time to write, fancy possessions, money to go to the ballet, access to friends with similar interests.
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