This Woman

Published in 1958, This Woman was the author's first novel to follow his 1939 debut, Christ in Concrete. He had done some scattered writing in those years, publishing magazine articles and writing an award-winning one-act play, The Love of Annunziata. Di Donato worked closely with the editor-publisher Ian Ballantine on the project. Initially, the work was developed under the enthusiastic oversight of renowned editor Bennett Cerf at Random House. The book continues the autobiographical fiction approach established in Christ in Concrete and explores Di Donato's life following his father's death, his spiritual conflict and obsessive sensuality.