The Love of a Bad Man - Softcover

'Compelling and powerful ... Woollett has inhabited the spirit of these various women in a manner both thought-provoking and touching.'

'[Woollett's] stories are beautifully written - poised and elegant.'

'With each finely tuned voice, Woollett draws empathy from abject horror. A confident and mesmerising performance.'

'Seductive and enthralling ... Woollett is a master of her craft. You won't be able to put it down.'

'The Love of a Bad Man imagines the inner lives of historical figures who committed crimes all in the name of love ... The stories treat death with a gothic inevitability and explore human darkness with a light touch.'

'[Woollett] raises unnerving questions about the nature of desire: about why any of us are drawn to people who are bad, or bad for us, and why we stay with them. That she refuses to answer them is not to the detriment of The Love of a Bad Man, and in fact ensures that the collection never feels gimmicky ... The stories are entirely concerned with conveying the distinctive interiority of the women, with the exploration of their impulses and insecurities. It is by the accretion of these case studies, rather than by armchair psychologising her girls, that Woollett builds her case.'

'Woollett explores power, obsession and warped love in this absorbing collection.'

'The Love of a Bad Man is a rare combination of immense writing talent and wondrous imagination. You've never read a book quite like this one.'

'A genuinely fresh reading experience ... we're sure to hear a lot more from this talented writer in coming years.' FOUR STARS

'Like Helen Garner, Laura Woollett is impelled to explore the darkest corners of the human heart, the savage cognitive distortions of love; to understand and empathise with the monstrous, rather than to instinctively recoil or judge ... Woollett's pitch-perfect command of narrative voice, period, and psychology creates 12 tales to fascinate and unnerve.'

A schoolgirl catches the eye of the future leader of Nazi Germany. An aspiring playwright writes to a convicted serial killer, seeking inspiration. A Mormon wife follows her husband into the wilderness. The Love of a Bad Man imagines the livesof these and other real women — Blanche, the sister-in-law to Bonnie and Clyde, Charles Manson’s California girls, and Marceline Jones (wife of Jim) — who were the lovers, mistresses, or wives of various “bad” men in history.

Beautifully observed, fascinating, and at times horrifying, the stories interrogate power and the nature of obsession.

A mesmerizing exploration of the lengths some women will go to for the men they love.