The book analyses some of the features of the prose written by two of the most well-known and eminent contemporary English writers: David Lodge and Tracy Chevalier. More precisely, the book highlights the way in which the two writers, as many postmodern authors defy traditional realism. For them, as for some other contemporary English writers, reality has become a purely linguistic concept. Contemporary reality, as well as the return to subjects which are inspired by history are always resynthesized, revalued. Reality is not constructed any more according to an ordered and fixed hierarchy, but rather as a web of multi-related realities. Along this line of thought, the book shows the ability and the means by which the analysed writers create hypothetical, alternative, distinct worlds as a condition of social existence, of the life outside the novels. - Brandusa Raileanu