Janette Turner Hospital — Orpheus Lost

Fourth Estate 2007 Trade Paperback, 358pp. In the ancient myth, it is Orpheus who travels to the underworld to rescue his lover Eurydice from death. In this compelling reimagining of the Orpheus story, Leela May travels into an underworld of kidnapping, torture and despair in search of her lover, Mishka. Leela is a mathematical genius who escaped her hardscrabble Southern home town to study in Boston. It's there that she meets a young Australian musician, Mishka. From the moment she first hears him play, busking in a subway, his music grips her, and they quickly become lovers. Then one day Leela is picked up off the street and taken to an interrogation centre somewhere outside the city. There has been an 'incident', an explosion on the underground; terrorists are suspected, security is high. And her old childhood friend Cobb is conducting a very questionable interrogation. (ISBN: 9780732284411). Very Good.