About the Author

Helen DeWitt is the author of a "remarkable first novel" (Daniel Mendelsohn, New York Review of Books), The Last Samurai, which has been translated into twenty languages. She lives in Berlin.

Reviews

"A triumph-a genuinely new story, a genuinely new form." -- A. S. Byatt - The New Yorker "The Last Samurai is an original work of brilliance about, in part, the limits of brilliance." -- Time "The book has been a great source of motivation for me. I must outdo Ludo, because he is younger than I am but smarter than I am. My father says that this is ridiculous, as Ludo is a fictional character. But this is precisely my point: how can I let a character who isn't even real outdo me?" -- Daniel (age 14)