fraeon
Films
BrowseTop 250
Series
TV ShowsAnimeTop 250 TVTop 100 Anime
Games
BrowseTop 100
Books
BooksMangaTop 125 BooksTop 100 Manga
For youTrendingTier ListsThe ArchiveLeaderboard
Log inSign up free
fraeon

Everything you watch, play and read — tracked, rated and remembered in one library.

Explore

  • Films
  • TV
  • Anime
  • Games
  • Books
  • Manga

Discover

  • Trending
  • Leaderboard
  • Find people
  • Lists
  • Tier lists

Company

  • Tour
  • About
  • Community guidelines
  • Privacy
  • Terms
  • Contact

© 2026 fraeon. All rights reserved. ·

Metadata from TMDB, RAWG, Jikan & Open Library. This product uses the TMDB API but is not endorsed or certified by TMDB.

Questions or ideas? mehmet@avortas.com

HomeFeedProfile
Original Bliss

Original Bliss

by A.L. Kennedy

Abused wivesFictionHusband and wifeMiddle-aged womenSelf-actualization (Psychology)
4.0
Open Library
Open Library

About this book

Helen Brindle thinks she has lost God - but it is simply love that she's missing. She certainly can't find it at home, with the violent, deadly Mr. Brindle: trapped in an abusive marriage, tormented by existential and personal doubt, she suffers from insomnia, emotional paralysis, and pathological inhibition. Until she meets Edward E. Gluck. Edward Gluck is a public personality, a renowned genius and group mental healer, guru to people like Helen through his famous self-help process; privately, he is painfully obsessed with masturbation and self-punishment, unable to employ his own fatuous self-help techniques to overcome his personal disgust and psychological anemia. Original Bliss tells the story of an excruciatingly awkward courtship between two soul-sick people - the one brutally shy, the other an exhibitionist - searching for a way to break out of their isolation. By turns acerbic and tender, and with remarkable economy and precision, A. L. Kennedy writes about the attempt to close emotional distances and fill physical voids, and the aching need for completion and healing.

Themes & subjects

Abused wivesFictionHusband and wifeMiddle-aged womenSelf-actualization (Psychology)Sex addicts

Setting

Glasgow (Scotland)Stuttgart (Germany)

About the author

A.L. Kennedy
A.L. Kennedy

22 October 1965

Scottish writer, academic and stand-up comedian.

Author

A.L. Kennedy

Pages

224

Read time

≈ 6h

Editions

10

Languages

English, French, German

Publisher

Vintage

ISBN

9782757812013

Where to buy

TR
Amazon Bookshop

Reviews

No reviews yet — be the first to write one from the Log screen.

Quotes

No quotes yet.

Discussions

Across media

The same story in other forms.

the film

Original Bliss

Similar books

The Color Purple

Fiction & Literature · Blacks

The Color Purple

Alice Walker

1976

Dance Upon the Air

Islas · Brujas

Dance Upon the Air

Nora Roberts

1902

Spencerville

Fiction · Abused wives

Spencerville

Nelson DeMille

1994

No place like home

Death · Home ownership

No place like home

Mary Higgins Clark

2005

Fractured

Fiction · Crimes against

Fractured

Karin Slaughter

1651

Trauma and Recovery

Post-traumatic stress disorder · Treatment

Trauma and Recovery

Judith Lewis Herman

1901

Motion to Suppress

Fiction · Nina Reilly (Fictitious character)

Motion to Suppress

Perri O'Shaughnessy

1995

The Glass Flame

Fiction in English · Murder

The Glass Flame

Phyllis A. Whitney

1777

Palindrome

Abused wives · Serial murders

Palindrome

Stuart Woods

1991

Strange Fits of Passion

Fiction · Abused wives

Strange Fits of Passion

Anita Shreve

1991

Black and blue

Mothers and sons · Man-woman relationships

Black and blue

Anna Quindlen

1998

Stolen Innocence

Abused wives · Religious aspects

Stolen Innocence

Elissa Wall

2008

The battered woman

Abused wives · Services for

The battered woman

Lenore E. Walker

1979

Getting free

Abused women · Abused wives

Getting free

Ginny NiCarthy

1982

Madame Bovary

literary fiction · French literature

Madame Bovary

Gustave Flaubert

1856

Othello

Drama · Othello (Fictitious character)

Othello

William Shakespeare

1622

Jude the Obscure

Social life and customs · Death

Jude the Obscure

Thomas Hardy

1895

A Doll's House

Drama · Translations into English

A Doll's House

Henrik Ibsen

1889