''Adultery'' (''Adultério'' in Portuguese) is a novel by Brazilian author

Paulo Coelho Paulo Coelho de Souza ( , ; born 24 August 1947) is a Brazilian lyricist and novelist and a member of the Brazilian Academy of Letters since 2002. His 1988 novel '' The Alchemist'' became an international best-seller. Early life Paulo Coelho ...

. It is the sixteenth major book by Coelho, and touches on the theme of adultery. The Portuguese edition of ''Adultery'' was released on April 10, 2014. The (American) English edition is published by

Knopf Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. () is an American publishing house that was founded by Blanche Knopf and Alfred A. Knopf Sr. in 1915. Blanche and Alfred traveled abroad regularly and were known for publishing European, Asian, and Latin American writers ...

and along with it, the Spanish edition was published on August 19, 2014. The reviewer in

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

found the book shallow and full of cliché, while "the sex is aggressive and gratuitous".Rebecca K. Morrison, "New Novel Fails to Stimulate"
14 September 2014
/ref>

Plot

A woman in her thirties begins to question her seemingly perfect life: she is married to a rich and loving husband, has well-behaved children and a successful newspaper career. Her apathy changes when she interviews a former boyfriend, now a successful politician. They begin a

sadomasochistic Sadism () and masochism (), known collectively as sadomasochism ( ) or S&M, is the derivation of pleasure from acts of respectively inflicting or receiving pain or humiliation. The term is named after the Marquis de Sade, a French author known ...

affair that she finds very exciting. But she must now conquer that impossible love and learn to face the everyday.

References

Novels by Paulo Coelho 2014 Brazilian novels Novels about infidelity 21st-century Brazilian novels BDSM literature {{Brazil-lit-stub