“Extravagance and debauchery are flamboyant partners, and Mosebach’s prose is polished enough to match the occasion. What is most enjoyable about this strange book is when profundity, grace, and beauty appear in the everyday. . . . What Was Before reminds us that not only is good fiction good lying, but lying and love are inextricable partners, no matter how rich you are.”

Literary Review

“Mosebach has written a novel of detection—of investigation not just into how one relationship came to be, but into being itself. What Was Before is not a novel of ideas, let alone a Catholic novel, but behind it lies an idea, perhaps a religious one, of how spirit and flesh cleave together. Whether Mosebach arrived at this idea through Mediterranean simplicity, study of hylomorphic theory, or a belief in the Incarnation hardly matters. He has refined it into art.”

First Things