It's All River: A Novel

“Lucy was a virgin-whore. A dreamer. She wanted to test her power. She wanted men to fast for her, to grovel, to pay tithes.”

Lusted after by everyone she meets, Lucy is the town’s most deviant and desired whore—and proud of it. But there is only one man who has captured her attention: the somber, ever-suffering Venâncio, a carpenter with a dark secret—and a wife. Once upon a time, Venâncio and Dalva, his angelic teenage sweetheart, were a shining example of marital bliss and the envy of all their neighbors—until tragedy left them estranged in their own home.

But Venâncio doesn’t desire Lucy the way other men in town do. In fact, he wants nothing to do with her. And if Lucy fails in seducing Venâncio, what becomes of her? Consumed by an insatiable need for Venâncio and driven mad by a growing obsession with Dalva, Lucy makes a decision that forever changes their three lives.

Introducing one of Brazil’s most daring and best-selling authors to English-language readers, and masterfully translated by Alison Entrekin, It’s All River is a taut, provocative allegory of violence and forgiveness that grips and stuns the whole way through.