The five most read posts on my blog over the last month
Review of Alphonse Boudard's The Devil-May-Care Fighters
Alphonse Boudard tells of his adolescence and early manhood in the 13th arrondissement of Paris, during WWII and the German occupation. His main preoccupation, throughout the novel, is sex and the fact that he isn't getting enough of it, apart from a few standup sessions in doorways with a female colleague whose boyfriend has been forced into labor in Germany and who, Boudard surmises, is probably honoring the German woman whose husband is off fighting the Russians on the Eastern Front.
An Excerpt from The Imitation of Patsy Burke: Carla and Véronique
Patsy's doting Italian mistress Carla is becoming increasinly concerned by the way his erratic behavior is frightening staff in the gallery that sells his sculptures. She raises the matter with him in his office over the gallery and what he tells her takes her out of her comfort zone.
My Traitor & Home to Killybegs, by Sorj Chalandon
My discussion of the French writer Sorj Chalandon's two novels about Tyrone Meehan, a character based on the real life character Denis Donaldson. Chalandon's novels show how Donaldson's betrayal of his friends in the IRA was also lived as a tragedy by a young Frenchman.
Hannah's World: being a young Turkish-Jewish girl in occuped WWII Paris
Le monde d'Hannah--Hannah's World, has been described by Le Figaro as "a small miracle of a book" in its handling of a forgotten part of French, Turkish and Jewish history," which Mohammed Aïssaoui describes as, "...the tragedy of the Turkish Jews who lived, in occupied France during World War II, in the "little Istanbul" part of the 11th arrondissement of Paris. Aïssaoui, in his Le Figaro review, said, "In the first part of the book, the novelist marvellously brings to life the existence of these humble people whose only desire was to get a better life for themselves, without being noticed. Everything is here: the decor, the smells, the words that were spoken, and Hannah's mother's never ending refrain, 'Don't shame us'. Then come the humiliations, the narrow escapes, the deaths of close family members. Ariane Bois's knowledge of the history of the period is impeccable, but it never weighs on the story."
Luc Boltanski: Investigation, Police Procedurals, Enigmas and Conspiracies
The French sociologist, Luc Boltanski, has just brought out a new book, Enigmes et Complots, which is presented as "an investigation into investigations". In his book, he studies the associated arrivals, at the end of the 19th century, of first the police procedural and then the spy novel, and how they were both invented in reaction to the modern state's stranglehold on reality.
Alphonse Boudard tells of his adolescence and early manhood in the 13th arrondissement of Paris, during WWII and the German occupation. His main preoccupation, throughout the novel, is sex and the fact that he isn't getting enough of it, apart from a few standup sessions in doorways with a female colleague whose boyfriend has been forced into labor in Germany and who, Boudard surmises, is probably honoring the German woman whose husband is off fighting the Russians on the Eastern Front.
An Excerpt from The Imitation of Patsy Burke: Carla and Véronique
Patsy's doting Italian mistress Carla is becoming increasinly concerned by the way his erratic behavior is frightening staff in the gallery that sells his sculptures. She raises the matter with him in his office over the gallery and what he tells her takes her out of her comfort zone.
My Traitor & Home to Killybegs, by Sorj Chalandon
My discussion of the French writer Sorj Chalandon's two novels about Tyrone Meehan, a character based on the real life character Denis Donaldson. Chalandon's novels show how Donaldson's betrayal of his friends in the IRA was also lived as a tragedy by a young Frenchman.
Hannah's World: being a young Turkish-Jewish girl in occuped WWII Paris
Le monde d'Hannah--Hannah's World, has been described by Le Figaro as "a small miracle of a book" in its handling of a forgotten part of French, Turkish and Jewish history," which Mohammed Aïssaoui describes as, "...the tragedy of the Turkish Jews who lived, in occupied France during World War II, in the "little Istanbul" part of the 11th arrondissement of Paris. Aïssaoui, in his Le Figaro review, said, "In the first part of the book, the novelist marvellously brings to life the existence of these humble people whose only desire was to get a better life for themselves, without being noticed. Everything is here: the decor, the smells, the words that were spoken, and Hannah's mother's never ending refrain, 'Don't shame us'. Then come the humiliations, the narrow escapes, the deaths of close family members. Ariane Bois's knowledge of the history of the period is impeccable, but it never weighs on the story."
Luc Boltanski: Investigation, Police Procedurals, Enigmas and Conspiracies
The French sociologist, Luc Boltanski, has just brought out a new book, Enigmes et Complots, which is presented as "an investigation into investigations". In his book, he studies the associated arrivals, at the end of the 19th century, of first the police procedural and then the spy novel, and how they were both invented in reaction to the modern state's stranglehold on reality.
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