THE OTHER GIRL is a bare, slim, literary novel written in a minimalistic style and telling the story of a conversation. Life does this switching trick, giving you hope from one place, and satisfaction from another. Maxim Smirnov, a young Russian immigrant in New York dreams of becoming the next software billionaire like Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and to move in with his gorgeous girlfriend. In the meantime he has no home of his own and sleeps like a gypsy on chairs and in his office. When his lover is reluctant to take him in, he ends up moving in with an older Italian girl Giordana Gatti, a reclusive film animator with a powerful personality and feminist ideas that clash with his macho upbringing. She is "the other girl" in more ways than one, and guards an old, secret, unrequited love story. How will her fierce spirit and masochistic passion reflect on his own future choices?Provocative, gritty, and unforgettable, THE OTHER GIRL is the story of a woman and a man on the edge, torn between the desire to belong and feel alive, and the desire to break away from unfulfilling love. Alexandra Ares writes in fierce, unflinching prose about the equally dark sides of passion and solitude, and the tenderness of hope.