The Day I Began My Studies in Philosophy

In nine finely crafted tales, Swedish litterateur Ekstrom ( Death's Midwives ) keenly and sympathetically observes the details and dramas of everyday life. The title story casts a woman who, faced with her husband's infidelity, decides to take a philosophy class. Wandering the school's maze of halls, she compares love to apartheid: it takes time to learn the rules, and one seldom has a passport, which has expired anyhow. ``Lilies of the Valley'' takes place largely in the mind of a 90-year-old woman. She fondly recalls a harvest festival where, ``protected by women and work,'' she could safely flirt; and she tries to quell her aging body's treachery. When ``The English Lady'' moves in with her boyfriend, her perfect love robs him of his well-worn anxieties, leaving him only a happiness that makes him profoundly uncomfortable. In ``On Distance Between People,'' a grandmother wonders about physics and astronomy as she performs household chores, but cannot convey her thoughts to her husband, who reads ``holding a book in front of his face like a shield.'' (Dec.)