Praise for The Violet Hour

“A beautiful book . . . The intensity of these passages--the depth of research, the acute sensitivity for declarative moments--is deeply beguiling.”--The New York Times Book Review

“Profound, poetic and--yes--comforting.”--People

“Unconventional, engaging . . . [The Violet Hour] is at once scholarly, literary, juicy--and unabashedly personal.”--Los Angeles Times

“Enveloping . . . I read it in bed, at the kitchen table, while walking down the street. . . . ‘What normal person wants to blunder into this hushed and sacred space?’ she asks. But the answer is all of us, and Ms. Roiphe does it with grace.”--Jennifer Senior, The New York Times

“A beautiful and provocative meditation on mortality.”--Minneapolis Star Tribune

“A tender yet penetrating look at the final days . . . Roiphe has always seemed to me a writer to envy. No matter what the occasion, she can be counted on to marry ferocity and erudition in ways that nearly always make her interesting.”--The Wall Street Journal

“Here is a critic in supreme control of her gifts, whose gift to us is the observant vigor that refuses to flinch before the Reaper. . . . She knows that true criticism does not bother with the mollification of delicate sensibilities, only with the intellect as it roils and rollicks through language.”--William Giraldi, The New Republic