Quatrième de couverture
'All kinds of evil under the sun seethe in Adam Thorpe's superior novel... wincingly precise in his imagery and technically adept, he has here crafted an electric and darkly gleeful read' Daily Mail
Two Cambridge academics, the historians Nick and Sarah Mallinson, take a sabbatical with their three small and lively girls in a remote Languedoc farmhouse. But the farmhouse contains its own histories, far darker and murkier than the Mallinsons are used to dealing with. As the illusion of Eden retreats, the couple begin to feel the vulnerability of being among strangers...
'An immensely clever, tragicomic novel... a rich meditation on past and present colonial politics... what resonates is what I greatly admire in all Thorpe's work: the complex depth, and the texture and poetry of his storytelling language' Financial Times
'An intimate depiction of family life... vivid and luminous' Independent on Sunday
'Because this is Adam Thorpe, there are two things of which you can be certain: that the writing will be gorgeous, silky-smooth, and that the plot will be entirely original, defying categorisation... read, enjoy and wait' Sunday Telegraph
'An intricate fiction that reminds us gently that war wrecks lives in ways too tangled to anticipate' Times Literary Supplement
Présentation de l'éditeur
An idyllic, old farmhouse in France is the background to a gripping story suffused with tension.
Two Oxford historians, Johnny and Sarah Thomson, take a sabbatical with their three small and lively girls in a remote and beautiful old farmhouse in the hills of Languedoc. But the farmhouse has its own histories, rather more fraught and alive than those the Thomsons are used to dealing with on the page.
As the illusion of Eden retreats, the Thomsons start to feel the vulnerability of being aliens in this unpredictable wildness. While Sarah frets about the danger of the swimming pool and the night-time visits of well-tusked boars, Johnny is more concerned by the locals — particularly Jean-Luc, the gardener. Is his taste for hammering tiny nails into dolls, collecting arcane rubbish, and secretly photographing Sarah, more than a harmless pastime? And how should they react to his eager befriending of their girls?
The novel, narrated from several points of view (most importantly from Jean-Luc’s), is about being among strangers, and being a stranger oneself. Writing, as always, with linguistic élan, imaginative flair, and an alert ear for dialogue, Adam Thorpe allows the comic to occasionally seep through, before returning us to the terrifying mysteries that feed at the heart of this thrilling novel.
Les informations fournies dans la section « A propos du livre » peuvent faire référence à une autre édition de ce titre.
